http://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/bullitt/2014/11/12/students-engineer-spaghetti-bridges/18914331/
Bailey Loosemore, [email protected]
12:52 p.m. EST November 12, 2014
Science teacher Devin Franklin's students have a common motto: It's better to have more than less.
More supplies to build the strongest of all spaghetti bridges. More materials to resell at heightened costs.
Enough noodles to not worry if one or two breaks — or happen to land in a teammate's mouth.
Daniel Davis, 11, shrugged Monday as he nibbled an uncooked noodle, valued at $1,000 fake dollars. "It's good," he said.
The sixth-grader is one of nearly 70 students in Bullitt County's Discovery School — a new program that engages middle school students who excel in science and math through hands-on learning, as exemplified in the project that requires them to build a 50-centimeter bridge out of nothing but spaghetti and glue.
Students have spent the past few weeks designing their bridges in teams and are now in the construction phase. Their goal is to build the strongest bridge using the least materials — a real-life concept displayed in the Ohio River Bridges Project.
Franklin said the spaghetti project isn't a new idea. It's often used in high school and college engineering courses. But it is uncommon for students so young.
"I don't know a lot of other places that have done it with sixth grade, seventh grade, but we've got advanced students here," Franklin said.
The students have taken to the project and have even introduced lessons teachers didn't expect, such as fair trade practices when selling supplies to other teams.
"We were looking for a way to account for the resources they're using, so we attached a price tag to each item to make them think about the cost of building a bridge, so they're not just using excessive amounts of glue," Franklin said. "The kids started to haggle and barter and buy resources to sell to other groups at inflated costs. They immediately made it a business."
Daniel and his partner, Drew Hadley, 12, are confident in their spending. They've spent about $1 billion on supplies — easy to do when a box of spaghetti costs $500,000 — and plan to sell off extras to teams that didn't plan ahead. Anything they don't sell will just be added to their bridge.
"If they don't buy our spaghetti, then we'll just have the strongest bridge," Daniel said.
Seventh graders Mackenzie Conn and Karlie Johnson, both 12, have been more frugal in their spending. As of Monday, their team had spent only $540,000 on a box of spaghetti and eight glue sticks.
The girls planned to buy more supplies once they decide which technique they would use for the bridge's base. On Monday, they presented their latest idea — gluing groups of 12 spaghetti noodles together in layers — to Franklin for approval.
"That feels significantly stronger than the last one does," Franklin said, holding the noodle mass. "... How much of this do you think is glue versus how much is spaghetti? It looks like a lot of glue."
"Probably 75 percent," Mackenzie said.
"Are you going to be able to build your entire bridge with 75 percent glue?" Franklin asked. "It's going to be a lot of costs."
"But it works!" Mackenzie said.
Mackenzie and Karlie said they like the project because it challenges them to think creatively.
"We have to really use our brain because all he really told us was what our experiment was, and we had to come up with our own idea," Karlie said.
Franklin said he has taught science for years, but he has never done such an in-depth, open-ended project. Students are encouraged to try every idea — like boiling the pasta and weaving it together — and have each brought their own strategies to the task.
"If this was teacher-directed, I would've never been able to come up with all the ideas they have," Franklin said.
Reporter Bailey Loosemore can be reached at (502) 582-4646. Follow her on Twitter at @bloosemore.
Bailey Loosemore, [email protected]
12:52 p.m. EST November 12, 2014
Science teacher Devin Franklin's students have a common motto: It's better to have more than less.
More supplies to build the strongest of all spaghetti bridges. More materials to resell at heightened costs.
Enough noodles to not worry if one or two breaks — or happen to land in a teammate's mouth.
Daniel Davis, 11, shrugged Monday as he nibbled an uncooked noodle, valued at $1,000 fake dollars. "It's good," he said.
The sixth-grader is one of nearly 70 students in Bullitt County's Discovery School — a new program that engages middle school students who excel in science and math through hands-on learning, as exemplified in the project that requires them to build a 50-centimeter bridge out of nothing but spaghetti and glue.
Students have spent the past few weeks designing their bridges in teams and are now in the construction phase. Their goal is to build the strongest bridge using the least materials — a real-life concept displayed in the Ohio River Bridges Project.
Franklin said the spaghetti project isn't a new idea. It's often used in high school and college engineering courses. But it is uncommon for students so young.
"I don't know a lot of other places that have done it with sixth grade, seventh grade, but we've got advanced students here," Franklin said.
The students have taken to the project and have even introduced lessons teachers didn't expect, such as fair trade practices when selling supplies to other teams.
"We were looking for a way to account for the resources they're using, so we attached a price tag to each item to make them think about the cost of building a bridge, so they're not just using excessive amounts of glue," Franklin said. "The kids started to haggle and barter and buy resources to sell to other groups at inflated costs. They immediately made it a business."
Daniel and his partner, Drew Hadley, 12, are confident in their spending. They've spent about $1 billion on supplies — easy to do when a box of spaghetti costs $500,000 — and plan to sell off extras to teams that didn't plan ahead. Anything they don't sell will just be added to their bridge.
"If they don't buy our spaghetti, then we'll just have the strongest bridge," Daniel said.
Seventh graders Mackenzie Conn and Karlie Johnson, both 12, have been more frugal in their spending. As of Monday, their team had spent only $540,000 on a box of spaghetti and eight glue sticks.
The girls planned to buy more supplies once they decide which technique they would use for the bridge's base. On Monday, they presented their latest idea — gluing groups of 12 spaghetti noodles together in layers — to Franklin for approval.
"That feels significantly stronger than the last one does," Franklin said, holding the noodle mass. "... How much of this do you think is glue versus how much is spaghetti? It looks like a lot of glue."
"Probably 75 percent," Mackenzie said.
"Are you going to be able to build your entire bridge with 75 percent glue?" Franklin asked. "It's going to be a lot of costs."
"But it works!" Mackenzie said.
Mackenzie and Karlie said they like the project because it challenges them to think creatively.
"We have to really use our brain because all he really told us was what our experiment was, and we had to come up with our own idea," Karlie said.
Franklin said he has taught science for years, but he has never done such an in-depth, open-ended project. Students are encouraged to try every idea — like boiling the pasta and weaving it together — and have each brought their own strategies to the task.
"If this was teacher-directed, I would've never been able to come up with all the ideas they have," Franklin said.
Reporter Bailey Loosemore can be reached at (502) 582-4646. Follow her on Twitter at @bloosemore.