Tobinhttps://www.tobinscience.com/webquest-8th-em.htmlStudents
How it works
1. Get your sheet
Your teacher gives you the webquest sheet (paper or digital). Every answer goes on it.
2. Open each stop in order
Each stop opens in a new tab. Use the sliders and buttons on that page — your answers come from what you see.
3. Come back here
Close the tab, tick Done, and open the next stop. Finished early with a partner? Play the bonus.
The webquest
Stops
Natural Forces Unit Intro
Read the Water Bender, pick a big question, play three activities.
Simple Science Videos: Fields, Circuits, Electromagnetism
Watch three one-minute videos and fill in the tables.
Vocabulary
Flip the Word Wall cards and define 14 words.
Natural Forces Part A: Static Electricity
Rub a balloon, test the rules of attraction, charge a sphere and a rod.
Natural Forces Part B: Circuits and Magnetism
Build circuits and burn out bulbs, drag a compass, test two magnets.
Natural Forces Part C: Electromagnets + Lab Bench Crane
Run fair tests on an electromagnet, then lift clips with a crane.
Natural Forces Part D: Gravity and Fields + Lab Bench Drop
Pull masses apart, weigh on the Moon, build the argument, drop two balls.
Wrap-up: Solve the Water Bender
Go back to the Water Bender at the top of the unit intro and explain, with what you learned, what pulls the water toward the comb without touching it.
Bonus: 1v1 8th Grade Natural Forces
- Only when you and a partner have both finished every stop.
- One computer, two players: Red uses the W A S D keys and Blue uses the arrow keys. It needs a keyboard, so it will not work on a phone.
- Press Enter the Arena, pick a game, and play to 3 wins.
Teachers
For teachers
Post this link for your students
Students move through six free tobinscience.com resources in order: the Natural Forces unit intro (the Water Bender hook, Charge Lab, Electromagnet Lab, Which Field Is It?), three one-minute Simple Science videos (Fields, Circuits, Electromagnetism), the unit vocabulary, the full Natural Forces section (Parts 1–5: the balloon-and-sweater sim, the rules of attraction, the conductor-versus-insulator spreader, the circuit builder, the field viewer and two-magnet test, a compass by a wire, the electromagnet lab with its fair-test checker, an investigation, the gravity explorer, mass versus weight, the three-fields table and a Claim-Evidence-Reasoning builder), two Virtual Lab Bench labs (Junkyard Electromagnet, Gravity Drop) and a 1v1 review game for early finishers. Every answer comes from what the page shows, matching S8P5.a through S8P5.c.
S8P5.a, S8P5.b, S8P5.c · S8P5. Obtain, evaluate, and communicate information about gravity, electricity, and magnetism as major forces acting in nature. (a) Construct an argument using evidence to support the claim that fields (i.e., magnetic fields, gravitational fields, and electric fields) exist between objects exerting forces on each other even when the objects are not in contact. (b) Plan and carry out investigations to demonstrate the distribution of charge in conductors and insulators. (c) Plan and carry out investigations to identify the factors (e.g., distance between objects, magnetic force produced by an electromagnet with varying number of wire turns, varying number or size of dry cells, and varying size of iron core) that affect the strength of electric and magnetic forces.
Time: about 80–85 minutes (two 45-minute periods, or one block)
Time: about 80–85 minutes (two 45-minute periods, or one block)
What students need
- One Chromebook or computer per student (the 1v1 bonus needs a keyboard and two students on one computer)
- Headphones, or low volume, for the three one-minute videos at Stop 2
- No student accounts or sign-ins; nothing to install
Every stop at a glance
- Stop 1: Unit Intro (about 12 min) · The Water Bender · Big questions · Explore activities
- Stop 2: Videos (about 10 min) · Simple Science: S8P5 videos
- Stop 3: Vocabulary (about 10 min) · Word Wall (unit intro) · Natural forces vocabulary
- Stop 4: Static electricity (about 12 min) · Part 1: Static electricity
- Stop 5: Circuits + magnetism (about 14 min) · Part 2: Current electricity · Part 3: Magnetism
- Stop 6: Electromagnets + virtual lab (about 12 min) · Part 4: Electromagnets · Junkyard Electromagnet (Lab Bench)
- Stop 7: Gravity + fields + virtual lab (about 12 min) · Part 5: Gravity and fields · Gravity Drop (Lab Bench)
- Bonus: 1v1 8th Grade Natural Forces
Good to know
- The intro's Charge Lab tests, the sorts and quizzes, the Lab Bench challenge target and the argument builder's chip order are randomized, so those answers vary. The simulation readouts (charge counts, force and strength, bulb brightness, every electromagnet clip count, the investigation data, the gravity percentages, the weight cards) are fixed and match the key.
- Stop 1 activities award volts that are saved only on that device; students write their score on the sheet.
- The electromagnet lab at Stop 6 compares each test with the one before it, so the six rows are a chain of single changes; skipping a row shows "Not a fair comparison" early. The Lab Bench crane uses a simpler clip rule, so its counts differ from the Part 4 lab on purpose.
- No Ohm's-law math: the Circuits video names V = I × R once and the sheet asks only what the three words mean. The Lab Bench Circuit Sandbox (V = I × R) and the Gravity Drop's Mystery Planet (g = 2d ÷ t²) are not visited. Weight appears only as mass × 9.8 N/kg.
- The 1v1 bonus is for pairs who have both finished. It is head-to-head review of the whole natural forces unit.
- The Natural Forces page also has endless practice (Part 6, a good warm-up the next day), worked examples (7), real-life cards (8), myths (9), the whole-unit practice set (10) and the vocabulary cards (11, used at Stop 3).
- Short on time? Stops 1–3 make a good first day and Stops 4–7 a second day.
- The printable student webquest and its answer key come with the Word / PDF webquest download. This page holds no answers, so it is safe to post.