This was a fun adventure in project learning for the class. The students were to create vehicles that traveled at least 1 meter, using only a mousetrap as the power source. The mousetrap had to travel with the vehicle across the finish line, and it could not be altered from its store bought state.
I encouraged students to use recycled materials and creativity to construct their racers. Many were successful in finding a majority of their materials in the recycling bin, or around their homes. We spent several days as a class researching techniques for transferring the energy in the mousetrap spring to propulsion for the vehicles. Creative methods for doing this were found by many, so then they had to problem solve as to how they could incorporate this into their vehicles.
After many days of construction in class and at home, teams were ready for race day!
The teams were to complete 3 trials each, measuring the distance their vehicle travels and the time it takes to get there. From this they can calculate the velocity of the vehicle, and average velocity for the 3 trials.
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