Sticky Note: This would be a great end of unit project as an assessment to see whether students have understood different parts of pollution. Could be useful to make groups inclusive including ELL) and give job titles to ensure that all students would learn and feel comfortable in their groups.
3.DP.4: Select a solution to the need or problem.
I would use only part of this activity (The Problem) and give students a list of pollutions they could choose to do their project on.
Sticky Note: This would be a great end of unit project as an assessment to see whether students have understood different parts of pollution. Could be useful to make groups inclusive including ELL) and give job titles to ensure that all students would learn and feel comfortable in their groups.
Sticky Note: This would be easy to manipulate for younger students by changing it from a cantilever structure to creating the highest structure with a certain number of materials. It could also be manipulated for older students by changing the materials to less obvious choices.
2.DP.4-6: Select a solution to the need or problem. Select the materials to develop a solution. Create the solution.
Do not use the scoring, just the activity. I would extend time frame to twenty minutes: 10 to brainstorm solutions and 10 to complete their structure
Sticky Note: This would be easy to manipulate for younger students by changing it from a cantilever structure to creating the highest structure with a certain number of materials. It could also be manipulated for older students by changing the materials to less obvious choices.
Sticky Note: This could be used for graphing if students had to test their structures multiple times, create a graph and find the average. Then could create a class graph of each group's averages. Could also be manipulated for younger students by changing the amount of materials.
5.DP.2-4: Brainstorm potential solutions. Document the design throughout the entire design process. Select a solution to the need or problem.
Omit the scoring, extend the time frame so that each group gets 15 minutes to brainstorm their solution and 20 minutes to build/test their structure
Sticky Note: This could be used for graphing if students had to test their structures multiple times, create a graph and find the average. Then could create a class graph of each group's averages. Could also be manipulated for younger students by changing the amount of materials.