Snap Circuit Challenge- Let's Begin Building!

Overview: 
Snap Circuits, by Elenco, are a great way to introduce students to circuit building. While the kits themselves include project ideas, this course allows student building back to the vocabulary and circuit parts studied in the classroom. This hands on exploration allows students to explore closed circuits, changing voltage and resistance in a circuit, and series and parallel circuits. This can serve as a reinforcement exercise, or an introduction before building with "real" circuit components.

Whether you're a novice or expert builder I encourage you to join our class and take a look at your Snap Circuits in a much different way!! It's easy to follow the directions in a book but let's take a moment to bring that to life and explore why the electrons move the way they do through our circuits! 

Week 1: We will learn about series circuits as well as the difference between open and closed circuits.  In the week one course we will discuss the components of a closed circuit and beginning vocabulary such as: series, circuit, switch, open & closed circuitry, resistor, load and voltage.  The class learning will be presented through a combination of PowerPoint and YouTube Videos. The hands on class challenge will be completed as a class during the live class time and directions will be broadcast through screen sharing.  We will leave class with one homework challenge to be presented at the start of Week 2's class. Up to 5 challenge projects will be built depending on time. (Learners are encouraged to build during the week and share a project at the start of each class)

Week 2: The first part of class will be a 5-10 minute show and tell/ discussion of any builds that the learners completed during the week. Light and Sound experimentation this week! We will start with presenting our homework project.  Next we will build up on our vocabulary of electrical components.  In this class we will discuss resistors, amplifiers, and practical uses for electrical circuits.  The class learning will be presented through a combination of PowerPoint and YouTube Videos. The hands on class challenge will be completed as a class during the live class time and directions will be broadcast through screen sharing.  We will leave class with one homework challenge to be presented at the start of Week 3's class.  Up to 5 challenge projects will be built depending on time. (Learners are encouraged to build during the week and share a project at the start of each class)

Week 3: Let's talk about parallel circuits!  We will begin the class by presenting our homework from the previous week. Next we will play a vocabulary game (BINGO) to help reinforce the terms and concepts that we've used this far! We will complete a lesson about parallel circuits presented through PowerPoint with the aid of an experiment on YouTube.  Up to 5 challenge projects will be built depending on time.