When class began, the class went directly outside to break their wax beams. Setup outside included bricks, cylindar blocks, and multiple weights. The students each brought outside a piece of paper to record how much their teams beams held. To test the beams, the students brought their beam forward, specifying whether it was a horizontal or vertical beam. Shilpa steadied the beams on top of two concrete blocks to prevent the beam from falling over before it actually broke. Then, Julie added weights, five pounds at a time to the wax beam. When the beams actually broke, they help anywhere from 75-115 pounds of weight. Some of the students were amazed by how much their beams held.
The students then went inside to graph their results. They did this on Interactivate, using a graphing applet called Data Flyer. They graphed the moment of inertia of their beams versus the weight that their beams held. They found that their vertical data was not very accurate, though their horizontal data formed a very accurate picture of the weight held. As the moment of inertia increased, the weight held also increased, forming a linear relationship.
After that, Shilpa explained the next engineering activity, also a competition between the students. This was a continuation of "In Straws We Trussed" which they worked on Wednesday. Each group was given 100 straws and 75 pins to build a structure. This structure had to stand up, and eventually hold as many marbles as it could up to 150 marbles. Points were assigned to each group by multiplying the height of their structure in centimeters by the number of marbles held. All groups were excited about this, and completed the day with this activity.