Experimenting with Marble Runs

One of the best children's toys (in my opinion) are marble run games, where children are able to design, build, and experiment running marbles through complex systems of tubes. The kit shown in the picture is from Scholar's Choice.

My daughter spent a long time engaged in the planning and building of her system. She examined the differences in pieces (shape, length, embellishments) and chose the ones she felt would best match her visualization of the perfect marble run.

She used appropriate and advanced vocabulary as she discussed what she was doing and how she anticipated it to work. When she tested a certain section of the run and it didn't work as well as she felt it should, she brainstormed and revised her plan.

I believe that young children in early years environments would benefit from having activities like marble runs as part of their science center. Future architects and engineers could be nurtured as they dream up exciting and intricate structures to explore. From experience, I know that the marble run is one of the most popular centers in my kindergarten classroom.