UCSD Engineering Project for San Diego Students Grades 4 and 6

 

If you teach fourth or sixth grade in San Diego, you might be interested in having your students participate in the University of California San Diego's Seismic Outreach program. This hands-on project follows the engineering design process used in the Next Generation Science Standards as students gain experience creating earthquake-resistant structures. Another great part of the program is the exposure your students get to engineering students at UCSD and campus life. 

The project begins with a visit from UCSD engineering students, who give a presentation on earthquake-resistant building design. Students then work on teams to create specified building structures made out of K'NEX pieces and test them either by shaking them manually or placing them on a homemade shake table (seen in photo above). UCSD provided me with directions for how to build one using materials you can get at a hardware store.

When building and testing specified structures, each team is given a variable to test, such as where to place bracing or whether to make the first story taller or shorter. Teams present their findings to the class, take notes on their peers' presentations, and then use this information in the design of their final building. Following the engineering design process, students build their models, test them on the shake table, and refine their design.

Students work on their test structures and buildings for a few weeks, so it helps to designate a space in the classroom for storage. 

The most exciting- or maybe nerve-racking- part of the program when students present their buildings to be tested on an electric mini shake table. This is done with a field trip to the UCSD campus or sometimes a second visit by UCSD students. My students look forward to the event but are also nervous about how their buildings will perform! Many buildings do break on the shake table, so I prepare my students by letting them know that it's the job of the UCSD students to try to break their buildings, and they are experts at doing this. Having buildings break is just part of the process, and when UCSD students have their own structures tested, they routinely break, too!

The Seismic Outreach program touches on NGSS standards beyond engineering. Students are introduced to waves by learning about the seismic waves that cause earthquakes. Earthquakes teach students about tectonic plate movement. Before starting the Seismic Outreach project, I lead students in doing activities related to the movement of tectonic plates and the location of fossil finds, hitting other NGSS standards.

If you are interested in learning more about the Seismic Outreach program at UCSD, follow this link:

https://scse.ucsd.edu/seismic-outreach.html

If you would like to explore another engineering project for middle school students, see my blog post about Future City Competition:

Students Explore Engineering and Sustainability through the Future City Competition

For a low-prep team building activity, follow this link to a blogpost on Venn diagrams:

Classroom Icebreaker / Getting to Know You Activity: Venn Diagrams

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Students Explore Engineering and Sustainability through the Future City Competition

The Future City Competition is an engaging, project-based activity that opens the door to middle school students in learning about engineering and sustainability. Students work on teams to design sustainable cities of the future, envisioning a world that they would like to live in. The project encourages creativity and problem solving. I have used it with my middle school students to teach the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) related to engineering practices and human impact.

The Future City Competition is open to students in grades six through eight. The season starts in the fall though the theme is announced in late spring. It's exciting to learn about the new theme and start to brainstorm ways of engaging students with it. 

I use the Future City Competition as part of the regular curriculum in seventh-grade science classes. Students start working on the project at the beginning of the school year. I put them in groups of three (four when needed). Groups begin with a team-building exercise such as a three-circle Venn diagram about themselves so that they get to know one another better (see link below). I review the new Future City Competition theme and introduce the deliverables that the teams will be working on. Students continue their work through early winter as they progress through the stages of the engineering design process.

The three main deliverables are an essay describing the design of the city, a physical scale model, and a presentation that uses the model. The model is always a student favorite. It is made primarily of recycled materials and requires creating one or more moving parts. The variety of the deliverables both highlight and develop diverse student strengths, including the ability to understand scientific and engineering concepts, competency in research and writing, the ability to create things with your hands, and presentation skills. Throughout the project, students develop teamwork, problem-solving, and project management skills. I tell students that each team member will bring different talents and strengths that will be helpful to their team at the various stages of the project. (I have recently simplified the city essay by requiring only an outline of the city design for teams not going to competition).

The Future City Competition has regional competitions, often for each state, and winners go on to the national competition. A regional competition may limit the number of teams sent by each school, so many schools have a school-level competition to select teams for the regional competition. Winning at the regional level and going on to the national competition is highly competitive, but there are more accessible prizes in multiple categories that teams may win. Teams from the Museum School have taken home several of these prizes.

Registration for Future City Competition opens in late spring and continues through the fall. Below is a link to get more information and to register.

Future City Competition

Here is a video of a team presenting their city design at the national Future City Competition:

Future City National Finals: Michigan

If you are looking for a team-building activity, follow this link to a blogpost on Venn diagrams:

Classroom Icebreaker / Getting to Know You Activity: Venn Diagrams

I hope that you found this blogpost valuable. If you are interested in joining my email list, please follow this link:

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