As science is a favorite subject in our household, we were excited to receive these videos to review. On the back of The Go Science videos it says they are geared towards children ages 6-14. Since my children are 10, 12, and 14, these were to work perfectly with my family. The LES website says the recommended ages are 5-11. Ben Roy performs experiments on this video
about 1st, 2nd, and 3rd class levers; incline
planes; pulleys; trebuchets; singing glasses; singing rods; sounds waves;
singing pipes; making a cloud; weather balloons; tornado tubes; and air
pressure. There are a few experiments on
this video that are interesting such as singing pipes and air pressure, but the
rest of them are ones that have been performed over and over again. Ben Roy speaks and gestures in such a way
that I feel this video would be more appropriately geared towards children 4
through 8 years of age. He speaks to the
children as if they are very young and have a hard time understanding
things. Even so, he mentions terms that
an older student should know or be learning about. He does not explain things very well. He performs the experiments and throws out harder scientific words, but he does not tell us the science behind the experiments.
Everyone in the video is wearing a yellow “Kid’s Time”
t-shirt. The kids don’t look very
comfortable when they are standing up front with him to do an experiment. He asks questions and feeds the children the answers if they give the wrong one. The whole
video isn’t very polished. He makes
errors as he speaks. Those mistakes are
caught, but he leaves a feeling of confusion.
In some of the later experiments, it seems as if he gave the children
the answers ahead of time to the questions he was going to ask.
His whole animation is a bit unnerving. I had a very hard time watching the entire length of the videos. Biblical
topics are discussed very quickly in some segments and not at all in
others. They are mostly the Bible
stories that children hear growing up.
The back of the video says, “Even kids who claim an aversion
to science will be engaged by the high-energy science demonstrations of Ben
Roy!” I would have to disagree. There is nothing about these videos that makes
my children want to learn more about science.
It also says, “Ben captivates, motivates, and inspires students to be
excited about science, while providing effective instruction based on science
phenomena.” Again, I would have to disagree. There is no effective instruction. Nothing is explained well.
Older children and children who are interested in science
already would NOT benefit from this product.
There is no challenge in it whatsoever, and it is tough to listen to him
make the mistakes as he is speaking, including grammatical errors.
The Go Science videos sell for $8.97 individually and $47.95 for all six including Motion; Simple Machines, Sound, and Weather; Magnetism, Engineering, Electricity, and Design; Chemistry; Air and Flight; Water, Space, and the Solar System through Library and
Educational Services. Even though I wouldn't recommend these particular videos unless your children are very young, Library and Educational Services has a wide variety of other products to choose from at great prices.
Their website is
Their website is
DISCLAIMER: I
received these products free of charge in order to provide an honest review of
them.
