Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions: You Can Build Yourself

by Maxine Anderson

Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions You Can Build Yourself introduces readers to the life, world, and incredible mind of Leonardo da Vinci through hands-on building projects that explore his invention ideas. Most of Leonardo's inventions were never made in his lifetime?they remained sketches in his famous notebooks. Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions You Can Build Yourself shows you how to bring these ideas to life using common household supplies. Detailed step-by-step instructions, diagrams, and templates for creating each project combine with historical facts and anecdotes, biographies and trivia about the real-life models for each project. Together they give kids a first-hand look into
the amazing mind of one the world’s greatest inventors.

Genres: Science, Art, Nonfiction, History, Biography, Childrens, Medieval

128 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Rymcwilly · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think that all of these inventions are cool but they are a little space wasting and there is a constant need of stuff that is not a daily house thing

[Gretchen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book as I was searching for projects students could make during a school STEM night. I loved the connection between teaching them about both STEM and an amazing artist/inventor from history together. What I appreciate about the book is that is can be used on many different levels. You are able to learn much more about da Vinci and his life and ideas as well as have fun. I could easily see a student getting this book and just looking at the pictures and projects and trying some of them out without really reading much of the text. I could also see the flip side of a student using this book to add wonderful details to their biography and using the ideas as drawings and text features rather than actually building any of them. I enjoyed a little of both and when we are able to go back to school and I am able to create the wonderful STEM night that my students were so excited about, I will use this book again.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got this as a birthday gift back in grade school...This is the book with the correct answers about da Vinci, not Dan Brown's awful bestseller. Even Walter Isaacson agrees with me with his biographical bestseller. da Vinci has been one of the world's greatest and most important historical figures: he's not just an artist, he's also a scientist and an inventor. Like, for example, he made what is considered the world's first working tank, albeit without the cannons. He also built the basis for the modern machine gun, he even invented a set of wings for flying. All these inventions are outlined in this book. I've actually attempted to assemble them myself, and with satisfactory success. This book is well worth checking out if you think you're so special as a young or old inventor...

[Diana · Rating 4 out of 5]

The information in this book was great and very informative. However, some of the projects were really involved and required quite a bit of materials/time to make. It would be helpful if templates were included with the book, or if there was a website they could be printed from. We did make a few things, and we ended up getting a kit from Amazon (a da Vinci kit made by National Geographic) which worked a lot better.

[Jbussen · Rating 3 out of 5]

My Bad. I didn't read carefully. This book is for juveniles. Age 9+. So in it's defense, I would have loved this as a father son goof off book. I would have loved this just to read as a kid. However. I was looking for like a backyard ballista or some such. Maybe a glider. Not a pinhole camera and arts n crafts for (Very young) boy scouts.

[Abby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in an easy to read and keep interest sort of manner (and learned more about Da Vinci from it than the previous book). But the try-it-yourself inventions are definitely not things that can be done by a child alone (as the book is purportedly a children’s book).
Read for a square on summer library reading program Bookopoly.

[Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has very interesting information about Leonardo's life. But, the directions on the projects aren't detailed enough, and they rarely worked for us. It is still interesting to read about the projects even if you don't do them.

[Denise · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book that covers a lot of Leonardo's inventions and fun projects one can do while reading about them. I found the water shoes interesting.

[Rachael · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read for summer reading. Bad

[Tracy Reed · Rating 3 out of 5]

We used this to pick out some hands-on projects to do along with our homeschool study of Leonardo da Vinci. It's got some good options, along with a chapter about each one.

[Mandee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions You Can Build Yourself by Maxine Anderson introduces readers to Leonardo da Vinci through hands-on projects that explore his ideas. Most of Leonardo's inventions remained as sketches in notebooks, but this book shows how to build them using common household supplies. It has many various types of print that really draws the reader's attention to the different topics.
Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions You Can Build Yourself by Maxine Anderson includes a glossary that explains words such as "chiaroscuro", and "icosahedron", which were terms that I did not know.


Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions You Can Build Yourself by Maxine Anderson includes an index that will help you to find inventions quickly. The one that I would like to make for my children is "Make your own monster shield". I believe my four year old would set out looking for monsters with that.

[Mohamed Alsaid · Rating 4 out of 5]

من زمن الاقطاع الى زمن النهضه.
كان الاقطاعيون يملكون اراضى و اموال كثيره. و كان الفلاحين يعملون لديهم لعيشون و منهم من يعمل فى المصانع و الاعمال السياحيه للبلد. اجيال ورا اجيال يولدون و يعيشون ثم يتوفون. الحياه كانت سهله و مستقره و كانت منعزله. كل فرد يعمل فى جزيره لوحده.
و تمر السنوات الى ان تم حدوث حروب بين هؤلاء الاقطاعيين و التأمر على بعضهم البعض. سكان الارياف بدءوا فى الانتقال الى المدينه لتحسين ظروفهم المعيشيه بعد تركهم للاراضى التى ظلوا بها لاجيال. فالمدينه الان تمنح لهم تعلم افكار جديده و و طرق للتجاره. لاكن المدن اكتظت بالسكان و الماكن الغير نظيفه و صالحه للعيش و هى ظروف مثاليه لانتشار الاويئه. فانتشرت الامراض و من بينها مرض الطاعون.

[Joanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got the book for my son, but I couldn't tear myself away from it over breakfast this morning.

I found the bit about him playing practical jokes on his friends to be most amusing, but I most admit I'm glad they didn't give directions on how to use bellows to fill a room with a sheep intestine. Not that my son would touch a sheep's intestine, but still, yuck.

I have already decided that if I get to take certain items with me to a deserted island, a chicken will have to be one of them. I need to make paint, you see...

[Marian Keen · Rating 4 out of 5]

In my research for my next book [ Lexi and Leonardo and the Deadly Secret ], I encountered this book, Amazing Leonardo da Vinci Inventions You Can Build Yourself. This is a book that any creative, middle-grade teacher could use to inspire students. What child wouldn't want to make a camera, a monster mask, their own tempera paints, a perspectograph, or invisible ink! There are also other projects that are more challenging. The experience shows what an original thinking scientist Leo was.

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book about da Vinci and his inventions. The build it yourself projects are fairly complex (more so than the Ben Franklin book in the series), so this book would best fit middle schoolers on up. Younger children would need a lot of help from an adult.

[AK Velasquez · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was very well written, and explained the life and accomplishments of Leonardo DaVinci in a clear and easy to understand way. It had a lot of simple experiments that were similar to those that Da Vinci performed. It was more of a 5th or 6th grade level and had very basic information.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun activities! We loved the marshmallow geometric shape activity. Too bad the marshmallows I got were all melted together. It made for a sticky mess.

[Brittany & Kids · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved all these activities, but we just didn't really get to them. There's too much to do!

[Pam Porter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great resource for grade school and middle school teachers. It includes numerous projects that can be done with children that are based on Leonardo da Vinci inventions.