Papillion / LaVista Middle School HAL Students Learned About Alternative Energy

The third Engineering lesson for the Papillion/LaVista Middle School High Ability Learners was on different forms of alternative energy. The students built towers out of spaghetti and marshmallows, taking special care to make them structurally sound. After that, they built wind turbines using paper cups, plastic spoons, masking tape, and a leaf blower. Students learned the importance of structurally sound buildings in high wind conditions as well as learning about wind energy. They moved on to learning about and building their own, energy-efficient house with various types of insulation, then tested their house for its effectiveness with the leaf blower.

Students are learning about different types of alternative energy.
They learned the art of creating tall tower using spaghetti and marshmallows and tape.
Spaghetti and marshmallow tower were the first activity of the day.
This tower has quite a few marshmallows for its base.
Here is another spaghetti marshmallow tower.
They worked in groups of two to build their tower.
Here are students displaying their spaghetti tower.
After learning the basics of structuring a tower, the HAL students went on to design their own houses.
They are designing their own houses.
It’s time to build their house designs out of cardboard.
Students are using cardboard and hot glue to build their house designs.
They are building their physical houses.
Here is a finished house.
This group built a solar-powered hospital with free wi-fi.
He is using a solar-powered roof with aluminum foil.
Will it work?
They are outside checking out their designs.
Here is another house idea.
The students broke down into groups to make a wind turbines out of paper cups and plastic spoons.
Students are testing their wind turbine design to see if it stands up to strong winds.
More testing of wind turbine designs.

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