STEM Spaghetti Tower
My students were given 20 noodles, 1 yard of string, 1 yard of tape, 1 marshmallow (that I had to beg them not to eat haha), and 1 pair of scissors. Their objective was to build a standing structure within 20 minutes, using only the materials they were given. When the structure was complete, the marshmallow had to be on top. We started by asking questions and making hypothesis on what they thought would work or wouldn't work. We also decided to test out a few different types of tape(scotch, duck, washi). The most popular question was, "Which tape will work best?". My goal for them was to see how important it is to successfully collaborate during STEM activities! It became the perfect teachable moment when the group with the tallest tower was the group that worked best as a team. At then end, we measured our towers and discussed ways we could've better collaborated our ideas to help us accomplish our plan. In a fun and engaging way, they all realized that teamwork is the key to producing successful group work!
Way to go my little, engineering bees!
My students were given 20 noodles, 1 yard of string, 1 yard of tape, 1 marshmallow (that I had to beg them not to eat haha), and 1 pair of scissors. Their objective was to build a standing structure within 20 minutes, using only the materials they were given. When the structure was complete, the marshmallow had to be on top. We started by asking questions and making hypothesis on what they thought would work or wouldn't work. We also decided to test out a few different types of tape(scotch, duck, washi). The most popular question was, "Which tape will work best?". My goal for them was to see how important it is to successfully collaborate during STEM activities! It became the perfect teachable moment when the group with the tallest tower was the group that worked best as a team. At then end, we measured our towers and discussed ways we could've better collaborated our ideas to help us accomplish our plan. In a fun and engaging way, they all realized that teamwork is the key to producing successful group work!
Way to go my little, engineering bees!