Alexander Graham Bell
Background Information & Activities

© 1999-2012 BrainPOP. All rights reserved.

Help children understand that important inventors have changed lives. Inspire them to be inventors themselves and find ways to change and improve the world around them. This movie will explore the life and work of Alexander Graham Bell and discuss a few of his key inventions, including the telephone.

Alexander Graham Bell was born on March 3, 1847, in Edinburgh, Scotland. His mother was a pianist, even though she had lost her hearing and was deaf. His father was a teacher who taught deaf students how to communicate. As a young boy, Bell learned how to communicate with his mother using his hands and fingers. He was curious as a child, and he enjoyed studying different subjects and conducting experiments. When he was twelve years old, Bell made his first invention. It was a device that helped separate wheat kernels from their husks and it incorporated rotating paddles with brushes. His device was used on a family friend's mill for several years, and the mill owner even gave young Bell a workshop to try out his experiments and inventions. Later, Bell followed in his father's footsteps and became a teacher of deaf students in Massachusetts. One of his students was Helen Keller.

Help children understand that in the mid and late 1800s, people communicated with each other via telegraphs. The telegraph sent and received clicking signals over a wire. The signals were a code that spelled out a message. Alexander Graham Bell and other inventors, including Thomas Edison and Elisha Gray, were all trying to find ways to communicate speech over electrical wires. Bell and his assistant Thomas Watson worked on a device that could take sounds and change them into signals that traveled over a wire. Then, another device could receive the signals and change them back into sounds. Bell spoke into his invention and famously said, "Come here, Watson. I need you!" Bell and Watson filed a patent with the government. Remind children that a patent is a set of rights allowing an inventor to be the only person to make or sell the invention for a period of time. Eventually, Bell formed a company to manufacture and distribute the telephone and eventually revolutionized the telecommunications industry.

There is much controversy surrounding Bell's invention and the details of filing his patent. Though several people were working on inventions similar to the telephone, many people consider Bell to be the first to invent a device that could send and receive speech clearly.

Help children understand that Alexander Graham Bell continued to create and build other inventions and made innovations throughout his entire life. In 1877, Thomas Edison developed the phonograph, a machine that could record and play back sound. His phonograph, however, was quite fragile. Bell and other scientists and engineers improved Edison's invention by changing the design and some of its parts so it would be more durable. After President Garfield was shot in 1881, Bell invented a metal detector to help find the bullets. The device worked, but the president was laying on a metal-frame bed which interfered with the device's success and the bullets were not recovered. Later, Bell began exploring innovations in flight. He experimented with kites and tetrahedrons and later applied what he learned to planes. In addition, Bell helped design and build a hydrofoil, which is a boat that travels on top of the water to go faster. His hydrofoil broke a world speed record that was untouched for many years.

Help children understand that Alexander Graham Bell came up with ideas, inventions, and improvements that helped change many lives. He asked questions and wondered about the world around him. Use Bell's life and work to inspire children to create, innovate, and explore.

See more lesson plans and resources: BrainPOP Educators.

Alexander Graham Bell Teacher Activities

© 1999-2012 BrainPOP. All rights reserved.

Invention Convention

Hold an Invention Convention in your classroom and if possible, collaborate with other classrooms! Have pairs or small groups design a creation. You may wish for students to also try creating a prototype. The invention can help people do a small task or address an inconvenience or a problem. The invention can even be an improvement on an existing machine or device. Is there a way to prevent headphone cords from becoming tangled? How can we save energy at home? Brainstorm different ideas and have teams meet and plan. At the Invention Convention, groups can describe their inventions and share them with the whole class.

Inventors' Day

Have students choose an inventor and prepare a report. You may want to assign specific inventors to students or have them select their own, such as Henry Ford, George Washington Carver, or Thomas Edison. How did the inventor get the idea for their invention? How have the inventor's contributions changed people's lives? Students can dress up like their inventor and talk about his or her life and work, and bring in props, drawings, photographs, and other visuals. You may wish to create stations around your classroom where students set up their displays and stand next to them. As other students walk around to view the stations, each child can come “come alive” as the inventor and explain his or her life’s work.

Alexander Graham Bell Family Activities

© 1999-2012 BrainPOP. All rights reserved.

Impossible Invention

Throughout history, inventors have been told that their ideas were impossible. But, through hard work, innovation, and ingenuity, many inventors were able to prove their dissenters wrong. Have your child think of an impossible invention. What would this invention do? How would it help people? Then have your child come up design and sketch what the invention would look like. Encourage your child to be creative!

Telephone

Demonstrate the basic principle of how a telephone works by creating your own! Connect two paper or foam cups with a piece of string. Then talk in one cup while your child listens through the other. Explain how sound can cause the string to vibrate, or move back and forth. The sound travels along the string from one cup to another. Experiment with how the length or thickness of string can affect the sound. Pull the string taut and talk, then let it fall slack and try talking again. How is the sound quality affected by the string’s position?