Paper Drop Design Competition
Using paper, paper clips and tape, student teams design flying/falling devices to stay in the air as long as possible and land as close as possible to a given target. Student teams use the steps of the engineering design process to guide them through the initial conception, evaluation, testing and re-design stages. The activity culminates with a classroom competition and scoring to evaluate how each team's design performed.
How close to the target can you get?Copyright Metropolitan Transportation Commission, Oakland, CA http://www.mtc.ca.gov/meetings/events/target.htm
Like this activity, engineers are challenged to solve problems with a design objective, requirements and constraints. They follow the steps of the engineering design process as they develop the best solution to meet the objectives for a given scenario.
After this activity, students should be able to:
- Design and construct a flying device that meets specific requirements.
- Describe the components of the engineering design process and cite specific examples of each component.
- Describe how they evaluated design trade-offs in the creation of the device.