When Science Fails

Wawawa.... You know those great inquiries that you have all planned out and oh what fun it will be, the kids will be so engaged and I can't wait to hear their thinking... Yeah reality sets in and the experiment FLOPS.  It was one of those days yesterday.  We were conducting an investigation into what happens to the energy when two objects collide.  (PS3.C)  So we set out to see what happens when two mables, attached at then of a string (like a double pendulum) collide.  Sounds doable right?!

Yeah, you know what happened....NOTHING! They just flew past each other or the strings got tangled and just wound around each other.  So, we weren't able to measure the effect of the collision, or really observe the energy transfer.  Great- another fabulous (in my head) idea out the window.  

I had to go back to the drawing board and think about how I can get the students to understand this concept, because obviously the marble idea was not a success.  Well, why not bring in another standard that requires them to design and test a model?  So that is just what I did on day two.  We began by talking about what scientists and engineers do and how often times it will take several attempts to successfully find solutions to problems.  That is just what we had to do now.  I gave them the task of designing their own model that would demonstrate what happens to energy when two objects collide.  They had to design their model within the following parameters: 

    - It had to be something that could be easily replicated.

    - The materials used had to be those that I could get access to easily at school or at home. (no crashing of cars into walls etc).  

Their designs were great!! I was so excited to see them applying all aspects of science AND bringing in what we've been investigating in language workshop!! 

 Whew, much more successful and way more meaningful for them!! I had so many of them go home that night and try out their models- it was awesome!!