Thursday, June 14, 2018

Need for Speed; A Car STEM Project

Cars students made for a STEM Project


Do you need to keep kids engaged the last few weeks of school?  Are your kids bored at home?  STEM camp?  I have the answer for you!  In the South, we get out of school in May.  We spent the last few weeks of school researching and experimenting with Newton's laws.  We used what we learned to create the most aerodynamic cars possible and ended the year with a big race.  The kids had so much fun!  They were so busy learning, they didn't have time to get in trouble!!  I call that the ultimate win!

 We started the unit off by learning about wheels and axles.  We watched a few videos and recorded our findings.  Then, we tried out what we learned.


Some experiments students will complete to learn about wheels and axels.


Then, we studied Newton's Second Law of Motion.  Here are a few pictures of our experiments.

Some experiments students did to learn about friction and aerodynamics.

Our next step was to learn about air resistance.  For practical purposes, some of our experiments involved water.  We discussed how water resistance is similar to air resistance.

Experiments students completed to learn about aerodynamics.


I found several different videos of a variety of cars on youtube.  I made QR codes for each video.  Students were able to watch each video and take notes about what they liked or what they might want to try.  

We spent the last few days building, racing, and rebuilding getting ready for the big race.  Here are the cars the kids made.


Cars students created during our STEM project.


The fastest cars from our STEM project race.


Check out the entire unit here .


Share:

1 comment

© One Room Schoolhouse | All rights reserved.
Blog Layout Created by pipdig