Building Rafts... Part 2

Due to rainy weather, we had to postpone floating our rafts until today.  I filled 3 Rubbermaid tubs with about 4-5 inches of water, and had small buckets with enough pennies for each group.

Students started by placing their first raft in the water, and then placing pennies, one at a time, into the dixie cup, until the raft sank. 

           

Students collected their data into a table, and then created a scatterplot of their data.  Then, they found the line of best fit for their data.  In the future, I will definitely be using this activity during our unit on scatter plots and lines of best fit.

Aside from my person injury (most of my toenail got destroyed when someone slipped into me), I felt like it was a very successful activity, and one that the students definitely enjoyed! 

Building Rafts, Part 1

We are done with testing, and wrapping up the year.  In my seventh grade classes, I have a few things i want to do with them to get them as ready as possible for eighth grade (especially now that I've taught eighth grade for a year). 

On the other hand, my eighth graders are DONE!  So, today we began the first of our projects. 

Earlier in the year I stumbeld across the Building Rafts Project on TpT.  I actually wanted us to get to do it before testing, because it looks like it's going to be great for creating scatterplots and lines of best fit, but it will be a great activity to do with the nice weather.

Today, the groups built their five rafts, according to the specifications.  I had my students do this a day in advance because of some experience I had with glue and popsicle sticks not being very sturdy earlier in the year.  It was interesting to see them interpret the directions in their own way.

Tomorrow, they are going to see how many pennies it takes to sink each of their rafts... One group decided to try and "water seal" their rafts with extra glue, they might not sink haha!