Second-graders at African Road Elementary School were junior engineers for the morning on June 3, 2019, when volunteers from Lockheed Martin came into their classrooms to lead them in a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) activity. The lesson was about "What Sinks and What Floats."
African Road parents Renjan Instrella and Gabriel Young asked the junior engineers if they thought various items, such as a rock, paper, a bowl or a balloon would sink or float. They talked to the second-graders about what engineers do, the engineering process and even Archimedes' buoyant force theory (in terms that second-graders could absorb).
The students then paired up into teams and used materials supplied by Lockheed Martin - paper plates, balloons, plastic straws, popsicle sticks, sheets of aluminum foil, etc. - to build a design that not only would float, but would hold the most metal washers when placed in a bin of water. Encouraged to communicate with one another as they collaborated, the students went through six of the seven steps of the Engineering Design process: 1) Define the problem. 2) Research and observe. 3) Respect the rules and requirements. 4) Brainstorm 5) Build and 6) Test.
After much application of tape, the designs were eagerly tested. In Ms. Bigney's classroom, the design engineered by the team of Jay Dean-Poole and Jason Tran demonstrated its buoyancy and strength by holding 41 metal washers! In Ms. Jones' class, the design built by the team of Ivy DiPasqua, Alexis Lozada and Emily Sopko held 35 washers before sinking. Congratulations to all the teams of second-graders who tried to solve a problem by inventing something and learned about the process of engineering design firsthand!