One Minute Mysteries

Reviews / Votes

Science teachers will thank you for having this book in your collection! Readers will be lured by the catchy story titles and short mysteries that cover a wide variety of science themes in Life Science, Earth and Space Science, Physical and Chemical Science, and General Science. The science content is woven into the story seamlessly, while keeping the stories to a page in length. With the Common Core Standards requiring reading and writing across the subject areas, this book is perfect. The stories provide a great opportunity to use content knowledge and critical thinking skills to construct a response. The captivating stories will encourage even the most reluctant reader. This is a great read for kids who love science as well as a valuable resource for teachers. -- Pamela K. Simmons, Library Media Specialist, Penn Ya, New York Library Media Connection, Recommended School Library Connection, 10/2013 Apparently, parents are more comfortable talking with their kids about drugs than about science and math. One Minute Mysteries: 65 More Short Mysteries You Solve With Science is the third title in this award-winning to connect math and science to real life. For those who loved the Encyclopedia Brown mysteries, these books harken back to them, though in a shorter format. Kids with inquisitive minds, interest in understanding how things work, or enjoyment of puzzles will be drawn to these quirky stories. Adults, too, might learn a few things, like whether or not all metals are magnetic. An excellent narrative format for learning about nature and how things work! -- Ryan McAllister, Ph.D., Biophysics, Georgetown University Examiner.com Why? This book helps kids answer that important question. Filled with kid-centric mini-mysteries and clear and concise solutions, One Minute Mysteries: 65 More Short Mysteries You Solve With Science encourages kids to think critically about real-life situations. With Next Generation Science Standards on the horizon, this book will be a sure hit in the classroom. An entertaining and educationally-engaging tool for science teachers everywhere! -- Gail O. Schulte, Recipient of the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science Teaching, Instructional Facilitator, Rutherford County Schools, TN I have been using your first One Minute Mysteries book as BRAIN activities with my 6th grade science class. It has been such a hit! The students love them because they are challenging-puzzles to be solved with their peers. They compete enthusiastically to solve each mystery before their classmates. I love them because each mystery kick-starts their brains into a critical thinking, problem solving mode in just minutes at the beginning of each class. The scenarios stimulate wonderful scientific debates among my students. They are a fun strategy for the students to apply their science knowledge to real world problems. This next book is as riveting as the original! I look forward to adding it to my classroom resources. Thanks again for creating this wonderful addition to science teaching and learning! -- Margie Hawkins, 6th Grade Science Teacher, Winfree Bryant MS, Lebanon, TN, NSTA STEM Forum and Expo Steering Committee These brainteasers are science magic! They help kids extract the important data needed to solve science and logic problems while strengthening and rewarding reading skills. My ten year old grandson devoured the book! He was excited when he knew the solutions and was eager to discover the ones unknown. Clever, entertaining and scientifically educational, readers will learn much from the concise, accurate solutions. There is a wide diversity of topics that children will want to investigate further. A perfect way to have fun with a child or grandchild! -- Robert Fenstermacher, Ph.D., Fisher Oxnam Professor of Science and Society, Drew University Learning how to sort the relevant from the irrelevant in an information-rich environment is how students become critical thinkers. This book is a refreshing gateway into scientific investigation. A perfect bedtime ritual, it triggers dialog between parents and their kids. Just the ticket for families to enjoy together or for keeping the kids stimulated on a long car trip or a rainy afternoon! -- Thomas Peters, Ed.D., Executive Director South Carolina Coalition for Mathematics and Science, Clemson University Wow, I love these! These fabulous little mysteries encourage curiosity, develop critical thinking, promote creativity and, shhh... even allow kids to learn something! The Yoders have really come up with a family-friendly treasure! -- Hank Phillippi Ryan, Mystery author winner, Agatha Award, Anthony Award, Macavity Award Parents, if you've wondered how to help your child with science at home, these bite-sized mysteries are a surefire way to stimulate interest and ongoing conversations. This next installment in the series offers 65 additional intriguing and pragmatic science mysteries. These fun brainteasers will resonate with kids because they spring from their daily lives. -- Jan Mokros, Author, Beyond Facts and Flashcards: Exploring Math with Your Kids, Director, Maine Mathematics and Science Alliance Kids can't help but love science in this entertaining collection of stories. Each mystery encourages students to begin examining their world with a scientific eye. The mysteries are quick, yet challenging, making them a perfect fit for even the busiest schedule. Try solving just one, but watch out; you might not be able to stop! -- Matt Bobrowsky, Ph.D., Department of Physics, University of Maryland WASHINGTON, DC It's a typical situation. A mother has to run an errand and leaves a note for her kids telling them to help themselves to lunch. There are eggs in the refrigerator, it says; but, some are hard-boiled and others are raw...and they look the same. How can the kids tell which is which without cracking them open?The students in the fifth grade science class at Mundo Verde Bilingual Public Charter School in Washington, D.C. have to think scientifically to solve the mystery. Samadhi says she had to try more than one idea to differentiate between the eggs.It was kind of difficult, but it was fun too," she explains. You get to do things yourself. You need to try new things, you don't have to do what the teacher tells you. You get to try stuff that you think might work for what you're doing."Samadhi discovered that spinning the eggs solved the mystery. Raw eggs spin more slowly than hard-boiled ones because the liquid inside slows them down.Think, solve and learnThis puzzler - The Eggcellent Idea - is one of 65 in the "One Minute Mysteries" educational series. Each mystery takes about a minute and half to read and requires students to solve it using their math and science knowledge. Mundo Verde teacher Karen Geating Rivera notes that the series was created by Eric and Natalie Yoder, a father-daughter pair. And when they were first written, the daughter was still a middle schooler. So it's not just written for children, but it was actually written in part by the child herself."Every single mystery is written with characters that are children, and children that are facing real world situation that they need to solve using their background knowledge on math and science," she explains. So they're not expected to have a bunch of formulas in their head that they already know. It's just things that happen every day and that you just think from a scientific or mathematical perspective to resolve."WATCH: Video report on project: http://www.voanews.com/a/minute-mysteries/3628608.html'Minute Mysteries' Help Kids Solve Math, Science Problems0:03:120:00:00/0:03:12Science teacher David Levin says the mysteries get the children excited. If they enjoy what they're doing, they will learn. That's my philosophy. I like having the opportunity of having them in small groups, sharing their ideas, feeling the experiment in their hands."Kids have also to discuss the facts among each other before declaring the answer. Ten-year-old Dante finds these group discussions useful. You might come to an agreement," he says. You might come to disagreement. But sometimes once you share your opinions, you can find out which one is the right response and which one isn't."Creating learning opportunitiesThe latest addition to the series is bilingual: English and Spanish. The authors are trying to provide a resource for dual-language education, which is a growing trend in many schools around the country, including Mundo Verde. School instructional guide, Berenice Pernalete says having bilingual instructions helps the students who come from different backgrounds. I think that for a language immersion school, one of the things that teachers do in order to foster engagement in students and to be really creative is that they have shared experiences."Teacher Karen Geating Rivera says bringing the mysteries into the classroom allows her students to develop several skills at the same time, and learn from each other. The kids who don't speak Spanish at home, and who are learning Spanish as a second or maybe a third language are able to hear the native speakers in a natural, authentic setting and start picking up some of that language and vice versa," she says. The fact that they are leaving the classroom still talking about what we've done tells me that I really made it an authentic experience, something that they can walk out and continue using in real life."The "One Minute Mysteries" series, she says, is another tool to keep her students engaged and foster their math, science and bilingual skills. -- Faiza Elmasry Voice of America, December 9, 2016