Read Works
Read Works: Machines Can Move
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about simple machines people use every day. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Simple Machines: Lesson 2
This lesson will introduce the six types of simple machines and show how machines can increase efficiency by reducing work input needed. It is 2 of 2 in the series titled "Simple Machines."
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Simple Machines: Lesson 1
This lesson will introduce the six types of simple machines and show how machines can increase efficiency by reducing work input needed. It is 1 of 2 in the series titled "Simple Machines."
Khan Academy
Khan Academy: Simple Machines and How to Use This Tutorial
There are six simple machines. They are as follows: lever, wheel, pulley, incline plane, wedge, and screw. This tutorial will cover the first three.
Science Struck
Science Struck: Simple Machines for Kids
Gives short descriptions of the six types of simple machines.
Alabama Learning Exchange
Alex: How to Make Something Simple, Hard
Students will have completed a unit of forces and motion prior to the current unit of study on simple machines (lever, inclined plane, screw, wedge, pulley, wheel and axle). Students will review the functions and examples of simple...
Utah Education Network
Uen: Force, Energy, and Motion: Complex Machines for Simple Tasks!
Designed for Grade Eight, this collection of lessons provides information, examples and quizzes related to simple machines. Elementary students studying this topic will find this site informative as well.
The Franklin Institute
Spotlighting Simple Machines
Simple machines such as inclined planes in wedges and screws are explained.
PBS
Pbs Teachers: Dish It Out, Simple Machine Game
Explore the physics of motion and simple machines with this interactive game. Try a pre-made challenge or set up ramps in your own challenge to get the mysterious Dim Sum ball into the take-out container.
Science and Mathematics Initiative for Learning Enhancement (SMILE)
Smile: Simple Machines (Grades 1 To12)
In this lesson plan students start by trying to open a paint can with their bare hands. Eventually, they will use a lever to open it. Various activities are used to enforce different simple machines.
Ducksters
Ducksters: Physics for Kids: Simple Machines
Kids learn about the science behind simple machines such as levers, wheels, pulleys, inclined planes, and screws. How they work together to make complex machinery.
University of Houston
University of Houston: Simple Machines Learning Site: Wedge
Several examples, along with a definition and explanation of the simple machine, the wedge.
Other
60 Second Science: Rolling Down Ramps Experiment
Explore the characteristics of inclined planes while observing how drops of colored water flow down a ramp and on different surfaces.
NASA
Nasa: Simple Machines
A lesson plan site that contains activities designed to give grades 3 and 4 experiences in using simple machines.
University of Houston
University of Houston: Simple Machines Learning Site
Simple descriptions and drawings of simple machines. Click on each image for a further explanation and examples.
ClassFlow
Class Flow: Simple Machines Quiz
[Free Registration/Login Required] This flipchart consists of a humorous quiz on identifying simple machines and forces of motion such as gravity and inertia.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Watch It Slide!
Students use inclined planes as they recreate the difficult task of raising a monolith of rock to build a pyramid. They compare the push and pull of different-sized blocks up an inclined plane, determine the angle of inclination, and...
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Tools and Equipment, Part I
Through a series of activities, students discover that the concept of mechanical advantage describes reality fairly well. They act as engineers creating a design for a ramp at a construction site by measuring four different inclined...
CK-12 Foundation
Ck 12 Exploration Series: Simulations: Physics: Ramp and Piano
[Free Registration/Login Required] This module has students using a simple machine to learn about the relationship between work, force, and energy.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Modern Day Pyramids
Students investigate the ways in which ancient technologies - six types of simple machines and combinations - are used to construct modern buildings. As they work together to solve a design problem (designing and building a modern...
Read Works
Read Works: Machines Can Move!
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about simple machines used in daily life such as: a pulley, a screw, an inclined plane, a wheel and axle, a wedge, and a lever. A question sheet is available to help students build...
Scholastic
Scholastic: Dirtmeister's Science Reporters: Simple Machines: The Screw
Scholastic provides an in-depth description here of a simple machine called The Screw. Also provides a picture and several examples for understanding.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Pyramid Building: How to Use a Wedge
Students learn how simple machines, including wedges, were used in building both ancient pyramids and present-day skyscrapers. In a hands-on activity, students test a variety of wedges on different materials (wax, soap, clay, foam)....
Beacon Learning Center
Beacon Learning Center: How Can We Move Our Principal?
In this problem solving exercise, students must decide which simple machine would work best in different situations, in order to help the principal manoeuvre himself after he has hurt his leg and can't walk. The site has a good tutorial...