This Kid Loves Science: Calorimeters

I don't know about your 5th grade boy(s), but mine wasn't really feelin' the whole school scene this past year. 

Reading comprehension:  "Huh? I can't remember." 
Math: "Ugh!  That's what I meant to say!" 
History: (He's not even in the room....)
Geography: "What country are we doing again?"

But when it comes to science, he's *generally* all in.  There's no struggle to get him to do the work or even engage in the reading materials.  He loves the hands-on nature of science and seems to genuinely love the subject.  So I'm always happy when it's time to do a science unit with him.  I know that it will be smooth sailing at least for this one subject and look forward to seeing him thrive in his element. 

My son finished the green level* of Moving Beyond the Page this past spring (FINALLY!!) and moved on to the blue level.  We had great success and learned a lot from the Energy Unit, especially from making the calorimeter together.  I never got around to posting anything about it at the time, but I found these great pics of him today while scrolling through our recently-downloaded cell phone photos and thought I'd post them for posterity's sake. :)


Anything that involves a flame is fun, right?  We burned different food samples and watched how they raised the water temperature to determine how many calories were in the various food samples.

It was really cool to actually understand what a calorie is and what it represents.  Gives a whole new meaning to the nutrition labels he's always studying.  Don't mind the messes....just keepin' it real.

*I do not own all the units of every level in the MBTP curriculum.  But I've slowly gathered and added to my library of their materials.  When I say we "finished" the green level, I don't mean we did every unit. We did all the units in the level that served us and our learning goals.