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Levers: Catapults
Students construct a catapult that shoots a cotton ball at least two meters using Legos, rubber bands, and plastic spoons. They discuss how the catapult works, and identify any problems they had with their experiment.
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Spaghetti Bridge
Students work together to build their own spaghetti bridge. They test the bridge to see how much weight it can hold before breaking. They discover how engineers use this type of information to design bridges.
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Eek, It leaks!
Middle schoolers construct model landfill liners out of two-inch strips of garbage bags within resource constraints. The challenge is to construct a bag that will hold one cup of water without leaking. This represents similar challenges...
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Propellers, Forces and Energy
Students construct a model airplane, measure distance, and calculate velocity. In this creative instructional activity students work in groups to build a model and use it to calculate distances and velocity.
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Up, Up, and Away
Students investigate the laws of physics that govern the flight of helicopters and airplanes. They build and launch a model rotor, simulating rotors used on helicopters to provide lift.
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Giving Directions
First graders view the object on their desk observing the colors, patterns, and the way the object is put together but not touching it. They then write on paper the directions they would give someone so that they would be able to build...
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Aerospace
Learners experiment with weight and balance of a glider. In this flight instructional activity students construct their own flying glider and record their experiment with it.
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Balsa Towers
Students build their own tower using concepts from previous lessons. They are given a set of materials to use and general guidelines. They share what they have created with their classmates.
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The Little Blue Engine
Young scholars listen to a read aloud of Shel Silverstein's, The Little Blue Engine. They design and build a Lego train that climbs a three foot incline, one foot at a time. They draw and write about their design.
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Tower Investigation and the Egg
Students build three types of towers, engineering them to hold an egg one foot high for 15 seconds. They discover that engineering designs are subject to constraints such as time, money and size specifications. In this activity students...
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WATER GOES AROUND AND COMES AROUND
Pupils build a model of a water system from the source to users and read and interpret a water meter.
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Wind Tunnels
Young scholars build a simple wind tunnel and test out 2 glider wing shapes at different angles of attack. They record results and their observations just as engineers do.
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How Far Will It Roll?
Learners construct a car with the longest roll using a ramp. They construct Lego cars, modify the wheel sizes and car configurations to evaluate which car design rolls the longest distance, develop a graph, and complete a worksheet.
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The Need For Shelter
Fifth graders build a shelter to protect themselves from rain. They perform durability and water proof testing on the shelters. They make observations of plants found in the Amazon rainforest.
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Cleaning the Air
Students investigate how engineers design methods of removing particulate matter from industrial sources to minimize negative effects of air pollution. In small groups they design and construct a filter with the goal of removing pepper...
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What Trickles Down?
Students explore different levels of permeability and compare the permeabilities of several different materials. They are introduced to the basic concepts of building design, landscape architecture, and environmental pollutant transport....
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Wire Maze
Pupils investigate what causes electrical circuits to work. They construct a wire circuit and pass a paperclip through the maze, trying not to touch the wire, and answer discussion questions.
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Rockets: Kinematics or Energy?
Students construct model rockets, measure and record the height of the launch. In this creative lesson students use different methods to calculate velocity and height data from their launched rockets.
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Mosaic Pavement Panel
Students analyze Mosaic art and identify the tessellation process. In this Mosaic art lesson, students read information about Mosaic art and the tessellation process. Students compare mosaics from various civilizations and construct...
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Kites of Japan
High schoolers perform research into the designs of Japanese kites in order to appreciate them for their aerodynamic designs. The appreciation builds student interest in order to produce their own similar designs.
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Wind Chimes
Students construct wind chimes using physics. In small groups they design and create wind chimes using a specific weights, number of notes, and keeping the cost under ten dollars.
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Magnets, Electromagnets, and Motors
Learners investigate the concepts of magnetism and its properties. They construct a magnet and test foods for iron content. Then students define the use of a motor and make their own electric motor while working in small groups. Then...
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Balsa Wood Airplane Flight and Speed Correlation
Ninth graders calculate the average speed of their balsa wood airplane. For this physics lesson, 9th graders build their own airplane and make necessary modifications to to make it fly straight. They interpret distance and time graph...
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Compass Designs
Young scholars investigate the properties of two and three dimensional objects. In this geometry lesson, students differentiate polygons based on similarity and congruence. They make observation and interpret the data.