Electrical Circuits & Jitterbugs

Eighth graders have been studying electricity and for the first time, I have the material (very few) to have student create their own series and parallel circuits.  First the class watched a video about how they are set up and the differences between the two.  Then, after being assigned a reading, students worked in a small group to build their own series and parallel circuits.  This made it so much more meaningful for the students.

Now, we are working on Jitterbugs.  I will post the link to the lesson plan and of course post pictures of our final products!

The Jitterbugs went well this year; this class was very creative.  The only thing was this year we used motors with wires and leads already connected.  At first I thought this would be a good thing because students wouldn't have to strip the wires of the alligator clips.  However, it was not a good thing when it came to our Jitterbug competition.  After all the Jitterbugs were completed, we had a contest to see which bug jittered the longest, farthest, etc.  Since these Jitterbugs didn't have the clips to simply clip on  and off the motor, students had to tape the leads onto the batteries.  This was not ideal, but the competition went well and the kids enjoyed it!  Here is the link I used to help with this project: Jitterbugs