C

This week’s topic is Aerospace Engineering. We discussed the different forces that are acting on a plane (draft, thrust, gravity, and lift) and drew a diagram on the board. We also talked about pioneer aerospace engineers, such as the Wright Brothers.

In spirit of aerospace engineering, we had the students build paper airplanes. We had two models in a worksheet with instructions. We made the first paper airplane together, step-by-step as a class. Once they finished this design, we had the kids line up on one end of the room and test their airplanes. Once the kids saw that this design failed, we went on and told the kids that it was time to redesign, the same way that engineers do it when one idea fails. We let the kids work on another design on their own. They could either follow the instructions of a paper airplane second design we had given them or create their own. At the end, we tested the planes one by one again and saw that the planes moved much farther this time around.

The activity was a bit chaotic but definitely successful overall. The kids were very excited about building paper airplanes. When we let the students work on the second design on their own, some were more independent than others; some students followed the directions or created their own design and asked questions only when they got stuck while others pretty much wanted us to build the plane for them. We thought that it was good that the first design did not work because it emphasized the importance of trial and error in engineering.