Last Thursday and Friday we were busy designing and testing our paper airplanes.  We experimented with different ways of folding planes to see which type of plane flew the furthest.  We created a graph of our hypotheses and then tested the different types of planes. We measured and recorded how far each plane flew. It turns out that the “Arrow” plane flies the furthest of the planes we’ve tried so far. We also experimented with holding the airplanes at different points to determine how that influences the flight. We also experimented with adding weights and parachutes to our planes.  While adding weight to the front of the plane made it fly farther, the parachute just seemed to add drag.

Dear Families,
Today we brainstormed about how to keep eggs safe so they can’t crack.  We also decorated the eggs. Wednesday we are going to make the structure that we brainstormed and then we are gonna put the egg in it and see if the egg will crack or see if the egg will not crack. 
Love,
PJ

Students’ high level of interest in paper airplanes led us to start a mini unit on engineering this week.  Today we began our “Protect the Pilot” project.  We each drew a face on a hard-boiled egg to create a pilot.  The challenge is to create a contraption that will protect the egg pilot and keep it from cracking when dropped from various heights.  Today we created our pilots and drew plans for making our contraptions.  Student engineers created plans utilizing a variety of materials including marshmallows, cardboard, tissue, toilet paper, bread, and egg cartons.  Tomorrow we will add to our plans and finish our materials lists.  On Wednesday we will begin building and testing our contraptions. 

View more photos from last week in our Jan 4-8 Photo Gallery
View more photos from today in our Jan 11-15 Photo Gallery