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Lesson Plan Template:
Guided or Open Inquiry
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Learning Objectives: What will students know and be able to do as a result of this lesson?
Students will:
- explain what a force is.
- identify and explain the forces acting on their sail boat during the race.
- identify and explain the forms of energy present during the race.
- identify and explain how energy is causing the motion of their sail boat.
- construct and test a prototype sail boat.
- collect and organize data as they test their prototypes.
- conduct data analysis to analyze and modify their design to construct a final sail boat design to race.
Student teams will present their designs to the class, explaining the methods that they used in creating the design and providing evidence that supports their final design.
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Prior Knowledge: What prior knowledge should students have for this lesson?
Students should have already received some initial instruction on what a force is and what the forms of energy are.
SC.3.P.10.1 Identify some basic forms of energy such as light, heat, sound, electrical, and mechanical.
SC.4.P.10.1 Observe and describe some basic forms of energy, including light, heat, sound, electrical, and the energy of motion.
SC.3.P.10.2 Recognize that energy has the ability to cause motion or create change.
SC.4.P.10.2 Investigate and describe that energy has the ability to cause motion or create change.
SC.4.P.10.4 Describe how moving water and air are sources of energy and can be used to move things.
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Guiding Questions: What are the guiding questions for this lesson?
What are forces that we are all familiar with?
We are all familiar with pushes and pulls which are forces. Gravity is a force that pulls two objects together, for students they will recognize it as items being pulled towards the Earth.
Students also tend to be aware of friction which they feel as they push things across the ground. Another common one is air resistance.
What is energy?
Energy is the ability to do work or cause a change and work is when you apply a force to move an object.
What forms of energy are you familiar with?
Light, heat, sound, energy of motion, and mechanical energy have been addressed in 3rd and 4th grade. Chemical appears in the standard for 5th grade. Moving water and air are also introduced as sources of energy in 4th grade.
What forces act on a sailboat as it sails?
Pushes from the water and the air.
How is energy involved in a ship sailing?
Work is when you apply a force to move an object and energy is the ability to do work or cause a change. In this case the wind is causing a change in the motion of the sailboat. There is also the energy of motion (potential and kinetic energy may be discussed here but technically potential vs. kinetic energy are introduced in 6th grade). The wind and water are both sources of energy and can impact the motion of a ship.
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Introduction: How will the teacher inform students of the intent of the lesson? How will students understand or develop an investigable question?
Introduce the concept of forces to the students by asking students to share their thoughts about what a force might be. After they have shared their thoughts about forces, ask them to explain what they think energy is.
After students share their opinions on what they feel that forces and energy might be, explain that a force is a push or a pull and that energy is the ability to do work or cause a change and work is when you apply a force to move an object.
After explaining to students what forces and energy are, conduct the following simple demonstration with them:
- Construct a simple paper airplane. If you do not know how, or if you would prefer more student involvement in this segment, ask a student or students to construct their favorite style of paper airplane.
- Once you have a paper airplane, throw it so that it will fly across the room.
- Ask the students, "What are some of the forces acting on the paper airplane as it travels across the room?" Some examples of forces would be gravity pulling it down, friction from the air as it rubs against the plane, the force exerted by the thrower.
- Ask the students, "How is energy involved?" Energy is involved because Energy is the ability to do work or cause a change and work is when you apply a force to move an object. In this case the boat is experiencing a change in motion. The boat has the energy of motion and the moving air and water are both sources of energy.
Explain to the students that they will be investigating forces and energy by having a contest on which team can build a sail boat that sails the fastest across the class "pond" (a long Rubbermaid tub filled with water). A fan will be used to provide the wind. Their goal is not only to be the fastest, but also to determine how forces act on the sail boat, and how energy relates to its motion.
If your students are unfamiliar with boats there are a wide range of resources available online with a simple search. http://www.boatsafe.com/kids/022298hulls.htm is just one site. Please preview any sites you recommend to your students. Many of them have external links and sites are always changing. Even sites recommended here should be reevaluated for appropriateness as a reference before being shared with students.
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Investigate: What will the teacher do to give students an opportunity to develop, try, revise, and implement their own methods to gather data?
Tell the students that in order to do this task, they will utilize the Engineer Design Process. Let them know that they will start with Phase 1, which is where engineers identify the problem and what things they will need to consider when designing their solution.
Ask the students to identify the problem for this project. Most will be pretty quick to indicate that the problem is to build the sail boat that sails across the designated difference the fastest.
Then ask the students what types of things they may need to consider as they are designing their sailboats. Tell them that at this point you are just talking about the sailboat design. Things that need to be considered in the sailboat design include: boat shape, sail shape, number of sails, sails placement, length of boat, length and height of sail, materials used to construct components, and materials used to attach components.
Next, ask the students about what other types of things engineers may need to consider when designing and constructing sail boats. They may provide a number of answers but some of the really pertinent ones at this point would be safety and purpose.
Divide students into small groups of 2-3 students. Explain that this will be their design team. One student should be designated as the recorder, and another student should gather materials. Every person in the group should still participate in the design, building, and launching.
Tell them that they will begin by constructing a prototype to test. Explain that a prototype is a model of a design to test. Let them know that they will have the opportunity to experiment with multiple designs.
As the students discuss, design and sketch ask them:
- Why do you think that this design will be effective? Formative: Can the students apply the term "force" correctly?
- How will forces act on your sail boat? Educative: Friction from the water against the hull of the boat, friction from the air will push against it, the force the air from the fan exerts on it.
- How is energy related? Energy is involved because energy is the ability to do work or cause a change and work is when you apply a force to move an object. In this case the boat is experiencing a change in motion. The boat has the energy of motion and the moving air and water are both sources of energy.
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Analyze: How will the teacher help students determine a way to represent, analyze, and interpret the data they collect?
Before students begin testing, set up your "pond" with a start line and a finish line using string and duct tape. The start and finish lines should be submerged so that they do not interfere with motion of the boats. It is easier to attach the start and finish lines with the duct tape when the container is empty and dry. The start and finish lines should be a few inches from the edges to allow the wind to fill the sails without interference from the walls. Filling the container should be the final step.
Tell students that they will now be entering Phase 2 of the Engineering and Design Process. Phase 2 is testing, so this is where they will build and test their sailboats. Because there is a fan involved and it is possible for it to stir up debris you may want to require your students to wear safety goggles or glasses. Please check your district's policies on practicing safe science. Please also keep in mind that you are using a fan that utilizes electricity in the vicinity of water.
Ask them what they think they need to consider while testing. Also, what should they be measuring? Last, how will they control their variables? Things that they need to consider when testing will go hand in hand with the last question on controlling their variables. The students need to make sure that they always start at the starting line and that the fan is always on the same wind setting. The teacher should establish the testing wind setting. The students should be able to recognize that there are external variables that can affect their outcome such as air currents caused by air conditioning units can also affect the outcome. The students should be able to indicate that they are measuring how long it takes for the boat to cross the finish line when launched from the starting lines. The students should also bring up that they need to consider how many times they test their boat. I typically have the students test each design a minimum of 3 times and they take the mean of the tests to determine which design had the best performance.
Allow the students to test their designs, ensuring that they are taking and recording measurements and observations.
Explain to them that they are going to continue to move forward in phase 2 and that their next step is to review their data. They need to determine what was good about this design and what may need some tweaking. Naturally there are some groups that will want to leave everything the same and tweak nothing and there will be other groups that want to start all over. You may have to help the students find the pros and cons of their designs to prompt them to modify their designs.
The students should sketch and label their new plans.
Students will construct and launch their new design.
This part may be repeated multiple times at your discretion and may be modified for time constraints. I typically allow my students to test 2-3 designs before proceeding to their final design.
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Closure: What will the teacher do to bring the lesson to a close? How will the students make sense of the investigation?
Explain to students that their next step is to work on Phase 3. Phase 3 is the presentation portion of the Engineering Design Process. In this step each team needs to share what they learned with the class. This includes design plans, modifications and results. Allow for other students in the class to be able to ask each team questions.
After the students have completed their presentations lead a class discussion utilizing the following questions:
- How did forces affect your sail boat?
- How was energy involved in testing?
- What outside variables could have affected our measurements?
Have the students write summary paragraphs that answer the following questions:
- What designs did you use?
- How did you modify your designs and why?
- What was the final design that you used and why did you use it?
- How do forces act on the boat while racing?
- What forms of energy were present during racing?
- What role does energy play in the motion of your sail boat?
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Summative Assessment
Use the attached Engineering Design Process Evaluation Rubric to evaluate student's performance during the Design Challenge portion of this lesson.
Have the students write summary paragraphs that answer the following questions:
- What designs did you use?
- How did you modify your designs and why?
- What was the final design that you used and why did you use it?
- What were the results of your boat race?
- How did forces act on your boat when racing?
- What forms of energy were present?
- How did energy impact your race?
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Formative Assessment
During the introduction, ask students:
- What are forces? A force is a push or a pull.
- What are some examples of forces that you are familiar with? Students may mention forces that keep things from moving such as friction, they may mention gravity because it pulls objects towards the ground, and they may also mention air resistance.
- What is energy? Energy is the ability to do work or cause a change and work is when you apply a force to move an object.
- What are some forms of energy that you have learned about before? Light, heat, sound, energy of motion, and mechanical energy have been addressed in 3rd and 4th grade. Chemical appears in the standard for 5th grade. Moving water and air are also introduced as sources of energy in 4th grade.
- What experiences have you had with energy? Answers will vary.
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Feedback to Students
As students are designing their boats, ask:
- How will forces be acting on your boats during our race?
- What forms of energy will you be encountering when we race?
- Why is energy important in the race?
As students are testing and modifying (during the Engineering Challenge portion), ask:
- Why do you think that you received the results that you did?
- What can you do to improve your design and results?
- Why do you think these improvements will work?
As students are testing their final boat design:
- How do you think the amount of energy is going to affect your boat race?
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