Simple Machines Jeopardy
Levers, pulleys, ramps, and screws: a simple machines review for grades four through six. Copy the board free; the class buzzes in from phones.
6 categories, 30 clues, Final Jeopardy. Everyone buzzes in from their phone.
Hosting opens the presenter screen with a join code for everyone's phones. Either way the board is a copy of your own. Free, no account needed.
Every clue on this board
This page is public, so anyone can read the answers — copy the board and swap a few clues before game day.
Levers
- $200
A seesaw is a lever, and the point it balances and turns on is called this.
What is the fulcrum?
- $400
The object a lever moves or lifts is called this.
What is the load?
- $600
The push or pull you put on a lever to move the load is called this.
What is the effort?
- $800
A wheelbarrow is this class of lever, with the load between the fulcrum and the effort.
What is a second-class lever?
- $1,000
A fishing rod, with the effort between the fulcrum and the load, is this class of lever.
What is a third-class lever?
Pulleys
- $200
A pulley is a wheel with this wrapped around it or running along its groove.
What is a rope?
- $400
This type of pulley, like the one at the top of a flagpole, stays in place and changes the direction of your pull.
What is a fixed pulley?
- $600
This type of pulley moves along with the load and cuts the effort needed about in half.
What is a movable pulley?
- $800
Pulleys make lifting easier, but you must pull the rope through a greater amount of this.
What is distance?
- $1,000
A set of fixed and movable pulleys working together, used on ships and cranes, is known by this three-word name.
What is a block and tackle?
Wheel and Axle
- $200
Turning this round handle to open a door is using a wheel and axle.
What is a doorknob?
- $400
The driver holds and turns this round part of a car, a wheel and axle that makes turning easier.
What is the steering wheel?
- $600
This spinning playground ride with a center pole is a giant wheel and axle.
What is a merry-go-round?
- $800
A screwdriver works as a wheel and axle, and this thick part you grip acts as the wheel.
What is the handle?
- $1,000
These wheels with teeth that fit together pass turning motion from one axle to another, as inside a clock.
What are gears?
Inclined Planes
- $200
Kids climb a ladder and then ride down this smooth, sloping inclined plane on the playground.
What is a slide?
- $400
The steepness of an inclined plane is called this, also used to describe a hill.
What is slope?
- $600
A longer, gentler ramp lets you use less of this push or pull to move something up.
What is force?
- $800
Roads that zigzag back and forth up this kind of landform are inclined planes.
What is a mountain?
- $1,000
Many historians think workers in ancient Egypt dragged stone blocks up ramps to build these.
What are the pyramids?
Wedges
- $200
This tool for chopping wood has a wedge-shaped metal head.
What is an axe?
- $400
This kitchen tool uses a thin wedge-shaped blade to slice food.
What is a knife?
- $600
This pointed metal fastener is a wedge that gets hammered into wood.
What is a nail?
- $800
A wedge pushed under a door to keep it from closing is called this.
What is a doorstop?
- $1,000
Your sharp front teeth, which work like wedges when you bite into an apple, are called these.
What are incisors?
Screws
- $200
Twisting the lid on or off this glass food container uses a screw.
What is a jar?
- $400
The ridges that spiral around a screw are called these.
What are threads?
- $600
This winding set of steps that circles around a center pole is a screw.
What is a spiral staircase?
- $800
This ancient Greek inventor is credited with a screw that lifts water uphill.
Who is Archimedes?
- $1,000
The distance from one thread of a screw to the next is called this.
What is the pitch?
Final Jeopardy — Ramp It Up
A wheelchair ramp is an example of this simple machine, which makes lifting easier by spreading the work over a longer distance.
What is an inclined plane?
How to run this board
Each of the six simple machines gets its own column here: levers, pulleys, wheels and axles, inclined planes, wedges, and screws. Clues move from spotting the machine in a familiar object, like a seesaw, a doorknob, or a zipper, to explaining how it trades force for distance to make work easier.
Set out a few real examples before you start, such as a pair of scissors, a screw, a doorstop, and a toy car, and let a team hold one up as their answer. Students remember the physical object long after the vocabulary word.
The lever clues are a good place to introduce fulcrum, effort, and load; if the class is shaky on those words, draw a seesaw on the board and label it after the first lever clue.
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Spotted a clue that's wrong or out of date? Tell us and we'll fix the board. Or start from a blank board and write your own.