Lesson plan (Alternative to UBD)
Rocket Lesson Plan
1. NJ standards addressed in the lesson.
a. 5.1 ll Students Will Learn To Identify Systems Of Interacting Components And Understand How Their Interactions Combine To Produce The Overall Behavior Of The System.
b. 5.2 All Students Will Develop Problem-Solving, Decision-Making And Inquiry Skills, Reflected By Formulating Usable Questions And Hypotheses, Planning Experiments, Conducting Systematic Observations, Interpreting And Analyzing Data, Drawing Conclusions, And Communicating Results.
c. 5.4 All Students Will Develop An Understanding Of Technology As An Application Of Scientific Principles.
d. 5.5 All Students Will Integrate Mathematics As A Tool For Problem-Solving In Science, And As A Means Of Expressing And/Or Modeling Scientific Theories.
e. 5.9 All Students Will Gain An Understanding Of Natural Laws As They Apply To Motion, Forces, And Energy Transformations.
2. Students should already know:
- Students should have some basic skills with constructing
- Students should have some understanding of forces
3. Goals:
Students will be able to design a rocket that will launch from air pressure from a soda bottle
Students will have some understanding of pressure ratios when consistent with the bottles and rockets
surface area
Students will be able to identify parts of the engineering design process
Students will have some knowledge of different types of engineers and what they do.
4. Student difficulties:
Students might have difficulties with keeping air from leaking out of the top of their rockets
Students might struggle with the concepts of pressure
5. Equipment:
Magazine pages, scotch tape, cardboard boxes, scissors, saran wrap
Lesson description:
Students will come together and have a quick teacher guided discussion about pressure. Talking about which will hurt more an elephant stepping on you with it's large flat feet, or an elephant in high heels. Talk about the ratio of force and area. Then tell students we will use this principle to design a rocket that will launch only using air. Students will receive a handout with each part of the engineering design process with areas for them to fill in with their own designs. Students will then be shown the launcher and how it will work. After being presented with the materials students will begin designing their rocket. When students feel satisfied with their first design of the rocket they will come outside in order to test it. Students will then be tasked with improving their rocket to try and make it launch higher. Once students have been able to make improvements to their initial design all students will come back together as a group and discuss what they liked about their rockets and what they would still like to improve upon. Instructor with then guide students in a discussion about what types of engineers might use the principals they were using to launch their rockets.
Other possible lessons could use Energy where students would attempt to find the work done by the launcher on the rocket by either finding the height or velocity of the rocket. Students would have to find a way to measure the height their rocket reaches in order to do this which can be difficult due to how high the rocket goes. If a the gym were to allow you to hang a tape measurer from the ceiling or a rope with incremental markings.
- Time Table – who is going to be doing what and when during the lesson to make sure that students are actively engaged.
Clock reading during the lesson / “Title of the activity” Relation to the goals / Students doing / Me doing
0 - 15 min / Students will discuss pressure / Students work with instructor to talk about pressure and how force increases with decreased area / Lead the discussion and answer any questions students have
15- 35 min / Rocket building and testing and redesign / Students work in groups to build their rocket and then bring them to test then resign in order to make them launch higher / Assist students when necessary and test their rockets when finished.
35-45 min / Class Discussion / Students discuss the parts they like about their design and parts that needed improvement, and how engineers might use what they did. / Lead discussion and ask questions when necessary
7. Formative assessments
- Students are able to design a rocket that launches from the launcher
- Students can work with groups to improve initial design
- Students are able to come up with some ways engineers will utilize the principles they used when doing actual engineering projects
Rocket Construction
Welcome Engineers: NASA is currently working on a new air pressure powered rocket and you are to build a prototype. However you woke up late the day before your presentation is due and only have some household materials in order to make your rocket. In order to achieve the mission NASA has planned they need the rocket to be at least 10 inches in length and must shoot off the launcher at least 5 ft.
Materials Provided: Magazine, Scotch Tape, Cereal Box, Saran Wrap, Scissors.
Design: Draw a picture of your design for your rocket and write a brief description of why you chose the design.
Construction: Build your prototype and test it. What parts of your initial design do you like, what parts would you change in order for your rocket to launch higher?
Redesign: Draw a picture of your newly redesigned rocket. Write what changes you have made and any compromises in design you might have had to make in order to add what you did.
Repeat: Repeat this process documenting any major changes. Discuss with the other groups how your design changed with from its initial build to the last one you completed.
Teacher Notes
Instructor materials and cost.
a. 10 ft ½ inch PVC pipe. $1.75
b. ½ inch PVC elbow $0.75
c. Empty Soda Bottle 0 - $2.50
d. Hack Saw
e. Tape (Duct or Hockey tape) $2.00
f. Hot glue gun/ hot glue. $15.00
g. Magazines $2.00
h. Cardboard (miscellaneous price)
i. Scotch Tape $1.50
j. Cling Wrap $5.00
Student Issues:
Students tended to make the launching portion of the process into a competition. This could potentially be dealt with by having groups launch at different times if that is at all possible.
Students who struggled with the initial design and did not see success did not make alterations, but simply scrapped their design and attempted to use designs the saw worked for other groups. Making sure students think about what is necessary in order to make the rocket launch off the launcher and having them make a detailed design plan could reduce this issue.
Instructor Issues:
Using the bottle as a launcher is great because if the bottle gets ruined you can simply replace it. The only issue is that you need to make sure that bottle cap is completely secured onto the PVC pipe otherwise it can be pulled off when you stomp on the bottle.
The rockets can launch fairly high if build correctly (We had a few launch about 30 ft.) so its not necessary to stop very hard on the bottles. Try to avoid the back end of the bottle which can potentially be crushed and then will not re-inflate. You can get about 15 – 20 stops out of a single bottle if you are not stomping too hard.
By possibly adding additional materials you could give students more possible designs as long as the material is lightweight and able to be taped to the other materials. This could lead to more variety in student rocket design.
Price constraints could also be added for materials that students use in order to bring in elements of resource management. If this is something you would like to do making saran wrap cost and magazine pages the least and scotch tape and cardboard the most would be likely to cause students to create very lightweight rockets which will shoot much higher. You could also reverse the two to make sturdier rockets that would not shoot as high. Depending on your location restraints these may be some options you might want to consider.
Avoid making a prototype of your own to show students before they design their own rockets as students will tend to copy your prototype instead of coming up with their own original design.