Curated OER
Put Your Truss in Building Bridges
Students apply abstract concepts, such as stress, fulcrums, the law of gravity, and the strength of different geometric shapes. Groups of student contractors operate simulated architectural firms to create strong, economical bridges.
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Build a Cardboard Bridge That Can Hold Potatoes
Students identify the characteristics of a bridge and build with junk materials. In this bridge building lesson, students use cereal boxes, paper towel or toilet paper tubes and tape to create their bridges. Bridges must be a certain...
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Building Big and Strong
Middle and high schoolers explore the concepts of architectural rigidity. They analyze a variety of polygons, and explain why some shapes add more strength to structures than others. The PBS video, "Building Big," is utilized in this plan.
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Stressed and Strained
Students explore stress and strength in engineering design. In this engineering lesson, students become familiar with terminology associated with stress and strain on building material. They will have a class discuss about how their beam...
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Spaghetti Bridges: Student Worksheet
Pairs of learners work together in order to simulate how engineers test materials for strength and safety in the real world. They use paper cups and pieces of spaghetti to run strength tests. This excellent worksheet should lead to...
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The Math in the Design and Building of Bridges
Research various types of bridge designs. Your class will be asked to consider what it would be like without bridges while learning about how they work. They will construct a model bridge based on given parameters. They then calculate...
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Be a Structural Engineer!
Young scholars investigate how to design and build items with a focus on structural strength as an engineer would. They complete a truss-building project as a final assessment.
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Building Straw Towers
Students apply their knowledge of technology to help them build. In this science and technology instructional activity, students build straw towers and investigate the strength and form of the structure. They analyze the best design the...
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Suspension Bridges: Connecting Lives
Students explore bridges. In this bridge lesson, students design and build a suspension bridge after visiting related websites and reviewing famous bridges in non-fiction books. Students follow the instructions from the "Build a Bridge...
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Mathematics Module
Delve into graphing! The concepts covered begin with basic graphing basic coordinates and algebraic expressions on coordinate planes, and build up to graphing linear inequalities and equations. Learners solve and simplify various...
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Geodesic Dome
Students build geodesic domes using newspaper after watching a video about the architectural concepts used in building domes. They decide which geometric shapes can be used to build the strongest building.
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Bold Bridges
Students explore bridge construction. In this bridge building activity, students view bridge websites and discuss how bridges are designed and built. Students design and construct their own bridge using the directions provided.
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Building Paper Bridges
Young scholars construct a bridge that can hold 100 pennies. For this math lesson, students evaluate the strength of their bridges. They predict how much weight a bridge can hold based on its design.
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Selecting the Best Material to Use While Solving Technological Problems
Students examine natural resources and discuss their pros and cons. In this sustainable environment activity, students describe reasons to use specific resources when faced with different problems, specifically why wood is a great...
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Electromagnetic Pick-up
Students investigate electromagnetic energy. In this magnetism lesson, students will create an electromagnet and test changes with increased energy. They will compete by building the strongest electromagnet.
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Spaghetti Graphs
Students work in pairs to test the strength of spaghetti strands. They collect and graph data to determine a line of best fit. Students create a linear equation to interpret their data. Based on the data collected, students predict...
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Spaghetti Bridges: Student Worksheet
In this math worksheet, students will create a "bridge" out of spaghetti and test it's strength with pennies. Students will record their results on a table and then graph the results.
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Spaghetti Bridges
Eighth graders experiment with building bridges of spaghetti, pennies, and a cup to determine how varying the number of spagetti pieces affects the strength of the bridge. They graph their results and interpret the data.
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Exemplary Plans, Engineer It!
Students research tall buildings and identify the geometric shapes used in the construction of the buildings. They compare shapes and infer why some are better than others in building. They produce a multimedia presentation of geometric...
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Toothpick Bridges
Students study the techniques of building a bridge. They explore different type of bridges and then plan and build a bridge to specified instructions. Students draw plans, keep a budget, and prepare balance sheets during their bridge...
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Spaghetti Bridges
Students thread a piece of spaghetti through the holes in the cup. One person suspend the cup by placing each index finger approximately one inch in from the ends of the spaghetti.
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Cross That Bridge
Students create paper bridges. In this geometry and architecture instructional activity, groups use legal paper and paper clips to design a bridge that will hold 100 pennies. Links to mini-lessons exploring stability of different...
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Geometric Shapes And Figures
Students compete in a scavenger hunt to find twenty-two different geometric shapes in natural objects around the school. They practice identification of each geometric shape using a handout then form small groups to search the school...