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Has exploring this site left you itching to learn even more about engineering, science and inventing? Want to design your own glider, sink the Titanic or play computer pinball with a twist? If your answer is a booming "YES!" then check out these books, activity kits and CD-ROMs! They’re our favorites! You’ll find them in most major book or software stores. Don’t forget to tell us about your favorite stuff! Send us an e-mail by clicking here and let us know what books and computer activities make science and engineering fun for you! We’ll add them to this site so other kids can enjoy them, too.
What do locks and flush toilets have in common? They were invented by the same person! In Inventions and Discoveries you'll learn many firsts. And often the first of anything was invented long before you thought. Consider this: what did you use before email to communicate with a pen-pal? Pen and paper? Before even paper was available, people in India and Southeast Asia wrote on the leaves of palm trees. As for wrinkle-free clothes, people have sought the perfect crease for at least 2,000 years! From irons to telescopes, this book shows the evolution of inventions with pictures and projects to help you along the path.
Ever walk through a library exit gate with a video from the video store in your knapsack? It may activate the radio receiver in the gate, and an embarrassing beeping sound shrieks through the library. Even though you're super embarassed, it's a great example of every day use of advanced technology. If you want to know more about satellites and radio signals read The Technology Book for Girls and Other Advanced Beings. It fills you in on the technology we encounter every day: lasers, infrared light, fibre optics, and radio waves.
Is electricity a mystery? Try illuminating the subject with this electric science kit. The kit provides the electronics and the manual. You need your brain, a couple of batteries, and other common household equipment. Before you begin putting a potato in a circuit or giving soap bubbles a charge, read the safety instructions. When a manual includes warnings such as "fire hazard", it's a good idea to take notice! Then grab a switch, a capacitor, and some wire and, well, Electronics Lab will give you some bright ideas...
Ever wonder how a camera works? In Great Inventions, the authors not only trace the greatest inventions in history, but show you how some of them work. Hands-on projects, such as making your own pin-hole camera are, well, illuminating!
'Bots, love or hate them, they're amazing machines. The DK Ultimate Robot Kit is for robot-lovers. Before launching into construction, read the booklet that celebrates how robots have changed and improved the lives of humans. For anyone wondering how they work, this kit provides everything you need to know about robots and the components to build five of them. Direction cards are provided to guide you through the step-by-step instructions. And if you think you'll never have a robot doing your homework—you're right.
Robots can carry golf bags, spray-paint cars and assist in an operating room. They’ve also been taught to pour drinks, pump gas and mow lawns. Learn more about these automated machines from the inside-out with Robot, one of the latest books in the Inside Guides series. Find out how a robot’s computer "brain" works, how robots see the world and how they move. You’ll also learn about the fantastic possibilities for tomorrow’s robots – researchers are already working on "nanorobots," which will work at an almost atomic level, repairing everything from equipment to people!
"Mr. Watson! Come here! I want to see you." With these now-famous words, Alexander Graham Bell sent the first telephone message way back in 1876. Although we have him to thank for making telephone calls possible, Alexander Graham Bell: An Inventive Life teaches us that Bell did a lot more than improve our methods of communication. Learn how Bell’s system for collecting rainwater led to the first bathroom shower in his neighbourhood, why he was made an honourary member of a Mohawk tribe, and what some of his other inventions were. Find out what he had to do with a plane that set a record for the first public flight in North America and how he co-developed a boat that set a world record for water speed. By the time you finish this book, you’ll undoubtedly agree that Bell did, indeed, lead an incredibly inventive and interesting life.
Author and illustrator David Macaulay and his Great Woolly Mammoth are back! Everything that made the original The Way Things Work a hit can also be found in this new version. You can explore the workings of over 150 machines and inventions from an airliner wing to a zipper. (Did you know the first easy-to-use salad spinner wasn’t invented until 1972?) You can learn about great inventors from 7000 BC to the present. You can even watch hilarious "home videos" of the mammoth getting into the invention act. As with the original, clever diagrams and comic animations illustrate scientific principles.
Author and illustrator David Macaulay and his Great Woolly Mammoth are back! In Pinball Science, your goal is to rescue a hapless inventor by repairing and rebuilding three pinball worlds. Read the "Inventor’s Journal" to get the scientific knowledge you need to answer the quiz questions and advance through the game. Explore topics including velocity, black holes, gravity, sound and magnetic fields. Answer a series of questions correctly, and you get to place components – from powder kegs to black holes to boats – on your custom - built pinball screen. The more questions you answer, the more complex – and fun – your game gets! Make it through all three pinball worlds, and you will be awarded with a certificate of honour and the exclusive right to bear the title of "Force and Motion Expert"!
Have you ever wanted to invent your own flying machine? Inventor’s Workshop: Flight helps you do just that. After reading the illustrated guide to inventions and inventive thinking, you are challenged to figure out how to use the included parts (cellophane, tissue paper, kite string, bamboo dowels, kite templates, etc.) to make six fantastic flying machines (a diamond kite, sled kite, snake kite, two types of gliders and a parachute). For example, after reading about the invention of the glider, how it works and its basic parts, you are challenged to design your own glider. Don’t worry if the creative juices aren’t flowing and you need some help. One solution, out of hundreds, is given for each of the challenges. Information about registering your invention legally ("patents") is also provided, so if you invent a useful, new thingamajig that actually flies, you can consider patenting it!
This book will give you a chance to build your own underwater devices. Projects range from simple to complex. You’ll only need a few materials to construct your own diving bell. Using a few more materials and tools, you can make a more complex diving bell or move on to building your own underwater habitats and gliders. With some persistence, maybe a little help and a long list of materials, you can build your own ROVs (Remotely Operated Vehicles). You can pilot these underwater robots and use them to bring submerged objects up to the surface. This is definitely one time when it’s a lot of fun to be all wet!
Have you got cardboard tubes, plastic bottles, tin foil, wires and batteries? Electric Gadgets and Gizmos can help you turn these materials into fun, battery-powered gadgets. Step-by-step instructions show you how to make nine, battery-powered devices that really go. All these projects require batteries and some require additional materials such as buzzers, motors and bulbs. With the necessary supplies (and maybe a little help from an adult), you can transform an old pair of sunglasses into a pair of cool windshield wiper shades. The fun doesn’t end there, though. Other projects include a squirting finger, a warning sign and a communications buzzer.
What does Stonehenge have to do with space? It was an ancient observatory and evidence that even 5,000 years ago our eyes were trained on the sky. In The Everything Kids' Space Book, learn all about ancient observers, the solar system, the galaxy and the fact that even light is trapped within a black hole. Space activities liven up the text, allowing you to discover some fundamental space "facts." You can also ponder the idea of alien visitors. Or is it invaders?
This hefty book is seriously worth every penny. If you need a good, reliable reference book The Firefly Space Encyclopedia is it. If you need to know the surface temperature of Venus; the millions-of-dollars space mistake; or whether it's possible to take a step on Saturn, it's all here. So is a good explanation for how a star is really born and how rockets work. The authors even get you started on practical stargazing. Definitely for the bigger kids.
This book is for the younger crowd. Fun illustrations accompany the easy-to-read text about the different planets in our solar system. Simple "experiments" are peppered throughout the book.
You really are the centre of the universe, find out why! In Bedroom Astronomy you can also find out the ultimate good reason for having a messy bedroom–the mess is organized according to cosmic principles. Aside from providing good excuses, the book explains how different cultures named the constellations and explains burning astronomical questions. Glow-in-the-dark stars and easy instructions on how to assemble Orion, the Big Dipper and other giants of the universe on your ceiling complete the picture. By the way, Deneb is Arabic for duck butt. Find out why. |
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