Learning+Experience+9

Session 1:
//Note: This Learning Experience should take several sessions, really, of students experimenting, building, and sharing ideas.//

Learning Targets:
 * I can solve the problem of how to make a clay boat that can float holding weights (called washers).
 * I can work with a team to solve this problem, sharing ideas, encouraging each other, and listening well.

Materials:
 * 1 golf-ball sized ball of clay per student
 * 1 foot-long piece of aluminum foil per student
 * 10-20 washers or weights per group of 4 (may use pennies)
 * tanks of water (1 per group, or fewer)
 * scissors
 * balances
 * Science Notebook page


 * Show students a weight or washer and ask what they think will happen to it in water. Will it sink, or float? Why?
 * Put it in the water and watch it sink.
 * Tell students their challenge today is to turn a piece of clay into a boat that can hold as many washers as possible.
 * Students can work with partners in their groups or alone, but should check out each others' work and share ideas.
 * When they are successful, they should draw what they made and write how many washers it held.
 * If there's time, do some sharing of what worked, how they improved their boats, why some worked and others didn't. What is the same about all the boats that worked? What is different?
 * After building clay boats, students can build boats with aluminum foil and see how many washers they can hold.

Sessions 2 and on
Learning Targets:
 * I can solve the problem of how to make a boat that can float holding as many weights as possible.
 * I can reason about why some boats hold more weight than others.

Materials:
 * clay
 * aluminum foil
 * washers
 * containers of water for testing
 * miscellaneous objects such as rubber bands, craft sticks, toothpicks, erasers, small cups, string, sponges, straws
 * science notebook pages


 * Each day, begin with some sharing of boats from prior days and ask students to talk about why they floated well and held more weight and why they didn't.
 * What helped you float more weights? How did you put the weights in the boat?
 * What problems did you have in making your boats? How did you try to solve them?
 * What materials worked well? What materials didn't work well for making boats?
 * Challenge students to use materials of their choosing to make more boats that hold weight.
 * Students draw boats and record weights held on the science notebook pages.