We've all heard of the classic egg-drop engineering challenge, so here's a twist - crash test race cars! The students in my extracurricular engineering class love this project because of its open-ended nature and thrilling process.
Learning objective
Learning objective
- By designing, building, testing, and redesigning crash test cars, students will be able to comprehend and apply fundamental concepts in physics and engineering including crashworthiness, resilience, mass, and momentum.
- Allowing students to direct their own learning by implementing the process of experiential education will promote the development of investigative problem solving, outside-of-the-box solutions, and independent decision making skills.
- Upon completion of the lesson, students will have acquired an individualized evaluation of applied engineering.
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Signing UpStep 1: Materials and Tools
This list is just an example of materials you can use. Be creative with your selection :)
- Wheels
- Skewers with 1/8" diameter
- Milkshake straws
- Craft Sticks
- Wood cubes*
- Cubes with drilled holes (optional)
- Rubber bands
- Small sample cups
- Hot glue
- Cardboard to protect work surface
- Plastic eggs
- Hard boiled eggs
- Downhill ramp
The presence of obviously soft or resilient materials will often hinder creative ideas.
Plastic Easter eggs will help students gauge how they will need to accommodate a real egg without risk of accident.
Folding tables make excellent ramps.
Fast, easy, and edible hard boiled eggs:
Place as many eggs as will fit in a pot of cold water. Make sure the eggs are covered with at least one inch of water. As soon as the water begins to boil, turn off the heat and cover. Wait 8 minutes. Place eggs directly from the pot back into the carton (most of the moisture will evaporate).
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1 sheet of paper
2 feet of masking tape
a rubber band a
3x5 index card
1 1/2 straws (for axil bearings and whatever else)
I provide the wheels and axils (the plunger from nestle "push-ups" ice cream)
Although I agree with: "The presence of obviously soft or resilient materials will often hinder creative ideas."...170+ students, supplies get costly. I also make them race each other so that friction also comes into play (another teaching point) and they don't try the "slow role" technique. there is a video here:http://youtu.be/XqI5H8d4r7M
You have some ideas I will incorporate. I need help making the connection (in the kids minds) to newtons laws. I "talk about it" (ho-hum), but I wish I had a piece that assesses the connection.
Materials do get costly (I also have about 170 students under my program), though I'm fortunate enough to have a $2 budget per student for each project. You could invest in wheels from Kelvin.com and reuse them if you can't afford to let the students take it home.
In my lectures I don't explicitly state Newton's Laws. Instead I focus on allowing the kids to learn about them by crashing their cars and observing the results; they learn by experience, not verbal definition. Let me know how you decide to incorporate the laws of motion in your next class. Thanks for your thoughts :)
Thanks for the link to kelvin.com, I have been looking for a source for wheels.