Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Viewing the world through a bug's eyes

This week's home work assignments for my kids involved learning about bugs.  Beyond being our family's resident bug killer when it comes to squashing the pesky ones we find lurking around our home, I didn't know a whole lot on the topic.  So we turned to makemegenius.com which provides free videos that explains scientific concepts to children in ways that are easy for them to comprehend.  Many of the videos like the one we viewed on bugs are portrayed as cartoons with an animated boy and girl explaining the topic so viewers appear to be learning from peers rather than being lectured to by an adult.  My children learned about the different types of bugs, the difference between arachnids (spiders, scorpions, ticks) and insects (ants, bees, beetles, dragonflies, flies, grasshoppers, praying mantis, true bugs and wasps) allowing them to easily answer their homework questions after we watched this seven minute video.



Other topics that makemegenius.com covers include astronomy, biology, chemistry, geography, and physics.  Videos can be sorted by age range (Kindergarten through 8th Grade) or by topic.  The animated sequences attempt to take concepts that my befuddle a student at school and explain them at the child's level to help him or her get a grasp on the information.  Videos range from being as simple as explaining why there is day and night to more complex subjects such as how does friction work, what are parallels of latitude, or understanding the digestive system.  The focus for all of these free videos which can be viewed either at makemegenius.com or on their youtube channel is to make science easy for kids.  If you have a child in elementary school or junior high this is a resource you should definitely check out!

Once my kids wrapped up answering their homework questions, we took a walk over to the neighborhood park to check out how the world looks through a bug's eyes.  Thanks to our Educational Insight's Animal Eye Viewers my twins were able to explore the playground through a pixelated bug's-eye view.  My son pretended he was flying like a bee soaring up and down on a swing while my daughter jumped all around the playground equipment like a giant grasshopper.


Unlike human eyes which are one big pupil, insects are made up of lots of little lenses.  Their eyes are too small to see as clearly as we see but they still provide a wide range of vision.  An insect's many little lenses help detect quick movements, which explains why flies can be so difficult to swat.  Also insects can see a broader spectrum of colors than human beings can which for example helps honeybees find nectar when examining flowers.  Using our insect viewer from our set of GeoSafari Jr. Animal Eye Viewers from Educational Insights, my kids were able to get a first hand perspective on how a bug views the world.


Educational Insights' GeoSafari Jr. Animal Eye Viewers comes as a three piece set that allows children to view the world around them as an insect, chameleon or shark.  Next week's homework  involves reptiles so we'll also be doing some exploring as well with their chameleon eye viewer to help make that assignment fun and interesting for them.  Hmm their teachers haven't given us enough advance notice to know if sharks is a topic that is coming up but I'm sure we'll have some fun with that version of the Animal Eye Viewers as well soon.

FTC DisclaimerA Geek Daddy was provided a complimentary Animal Eye Viewers set to review from Educational Insights.  Opinions are honest and my own.

8 comments:

  1. That second photo from the bottom here is crazy! Interesting to think about.

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  2. I like how the children are learning from peers rather than adults! I bet your kids loved that animal eye viewer.

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  3. Sounds like a very cool site. And I love the bug eyes - crazy!!

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  4. This is very, very cool. What kid wouldn't like to see things through bugs eyes?

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  5. That's really cool. Do you home school?

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  6. That's really interesting and theven bug glasses are really fun. I saved those websites for my kids when they learn about the insects in class.

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  7. Great stuff for kids. They will learn a lot from this. Awesome.

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