Geared 2!
Send a hamster flying off his wheel by choosing the right gears
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Geared 2!
Pros: Geared 2! is easy to start playing but keeps increasing the challenge.
Cons: Without hints or help, kids may eventually get stuck at a challenging level.
Bottom Line: Students will need to use logic and trial-and-error skills to learn how gears work.
Teachers could incorporate Geared 2! into a unit on simple machines that already has students working hands-on with gears and other simple machines.
This engaging puzzler teaches physics and simple machines. Students must position gears so the teeth meet and the gears rotate. As students try to guide a gear into position, its color changes to let them know whether it can be placed or not. If so, kids see -- somewhat graphically -- how gears can increase the speed of the source. For example, a hamster wheel rotates so much faster once the gears are in place that the hamster flies right off! Other details are amusing; the hamster makes a fun "yawn" sound effect when he’s bored because the gears aren’t moving fast enough, and he squeals when he’s flung.
Once he flies off, students see a report showing how long it took them to solve the level, how many moves they made, the distance they dragged the gears, the difficulty level, and how many levels they’ve completed.
The silly fun and challenging physics of Geared 2! will encourage kids to use logic and strategy to solve each puzzle. As the challenges build and students need to add obstacles, they'll use critical thinking and trial-and-error tests. Each level gets a bit more difficult, and the 60 levels will keep them challenged for quite a while. They can also create their own puzzles using the level editor or play puzzles created by other players.
Learning Rating
Solve Problems and Fling a Rodent
"Okay, so I took a little vindictive pleasure at tossing the hamster/gerbil/rodent off of its wheel (actually it was a lot of pleasure especially when it took me 10 tries to place the gears correctly). Essentially, Geared 2! is a game that asks the player to correctly place cogs to connect to other cogs, thus increasing the speed at which all items turn. If the player does it correctly, the furry little rodent goes for a spin and gets tossed out of its wheel.
Now, I'm not much of a gamer, but I got pulled into the game because I wanted to figure out how to win (much along the lines of Angry Birds--players complete the level at hand in order to get to the next level.)
The game itself is pretty intuitive; players can see if the cogs fit as they turn green or they stay red. Advanced levels have cogs with arrows that move one direction if set free by moving another cog. Once they all connect, there goes the critter.
As a teaching tool, Geared 2! could be used for problem solving, spatial relationships, and engineering applications. Students can keep their stats and track their improvement (this might be especially beneficial for SPED classrooms). I don't teach the science or math disciplines, but I believe there could be places in the curriculum that Geared 2! would be applicable as well.
One note of caution: Cheats are readily available online... Even though the one I looked up didn't help me (Level 1, Screen 13), screen shots of ""the answers"" were too easy to find for me to comfortably recommend using this as a graded exercise."
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