The Arizona STEM Acceleration Project

Building on a Budget

Building on a Budget

A 3^rd grade STEM lesson

Kelly Coakley-Magid

12/16/23

Notes for teachers

Students will practice their 21st century skills as they complete these building challenges. With a value assigned to each plank, teams work toward the goal of completing each challenge while spending the least amount of money.

List of Materials

• KEVA planks (or similar building planks)
• Rulers
• You can use off brand Jenga sets for building, or any other building supplies that you have, such as index cards, for a lower cost option.
• Challenges are pun and productive when they have something to stand up to. I like to use a small fan on the highest setting, for example. The fan has to stay plugged in, however, so I can usually only have 2 teams complete this challenge at a time. This will work out if you have 2 teams completing each of the challenges at a time and rotating around the room.

Standards

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Math:

3.MD.A.1b Solve word problems involving money through $20.00, using symbols $, ".", ₵.

Engineering:

STANDARD 2.0 CREATE ENGINEERING SOLUTIONS BY APPLYING A STRUCTURED PROBLEM-SOLVING/DECISION MAKING PROCESS

STANDARD 3.0 APPLY MATHEMATICAL LAWS AND PRINCIPLES RELEVANT TO ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY 3.1 Use basic mathematical functions and tools (i.e., Google Sheets, Excel, graphing calculator, etc.)

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Objective:

Today students will practice fluently adding money amounts in order to complete 3 building challenges.

Agenda

10 minutes to explain the challenge, form groups, explain materials and rotations if necessary

5 minutes for planning each challenge (4 challenges = 20 mins total)

10 minutes to build each challenge (Round 1 Building - 5 minutes, Round two building, 5 minutes = 40 minutes total)

3 minutes for students to plan the improvement round (4 challenges = 12 minutes).

4 minutes to reflect on the challenge (4 challenges = 16 total minutes)

10 minutes post activity class discussion.

108 total minutes.

Intro/Driving Question/Opening

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Can you complete 4 building challenges as a collaborative team while staying within your budget?

Hands-on Activity Instructions

• Students groups should have no more than three students
• Use the Building on a Budget Student Guide and Building on a Budget slideshow (following slides) to help assign and share the challenges with your students.
• Set a timer for each part of the activity to keep it from going one for too long.
• Timing suggestions are on the Agenda slide

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Cost Chart:

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1 plank = 25¢

Challenge 1: Build a tower that is at least 8” tall while spending $3.50 or less.

8 inch tower

Cost Chart:

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1 plank = 25¢

Challenge 2: Build a tower that is at least 4.5” tall and can withstand a determined amount of force (ie the Sphero Bolt banging into the leg of your table at full speed from a distance of 5 feet) while spending a maximum of $4.50.

fight the force

Cost Chart:

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1 plank = 25¢

Challenge 3: Build a bridge with a span at least 2 inches off the table and a minimum of 4 inches wide. A toy car should be able to pass under the span of your bridge, as well as “drive” across your bridge. Your budget is $4.00

Build a bridge

Cost Chart:

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1 plank = 25¢

Challenge 4: Build a house with a roof that stands at least 5 inches tall at its tallest point. The house must withstand the force of the wind from the fan on the highest setting for 30 seconds from a distance of 1 foot or less. Your budget is $5.00

Windy Walls

Assessment

Assess student learning by checking the math in their building on a budget student guides, as well as their structures as they are being built. I recommend having students check other teams to make sure they are sticking to their budgets. Students are excellent at making sure their competition is not getting any extra planks!

Differentiation

You can alter the cost of the plank to an easier amount to work with such as a dime or a dollar. You can show students possible building structures that could work for the competition. You could also allow students to use a calculator or manipulatives to help with counting including actual/educational coins. Another way to adapt this lesson is to remove the budget entirely and ask students complete the tasks with the lowest cost possible, and see which team spends the least.

Remediation

Extension/Enrichment

There are 4 enrichment sheets that could be used with students. The cost of the planks increases as you purchase more with these sheets. You could also remove the budget limit from these sheets and have the class compete to see who can complete the challenge for the least cost.