Light up your love with paper circuits this Valentine’s Day—no soldering required! Create a sure-to-impress flashing birthday card or design a light-up Christmas card—all with paper circuits! In this activity, students are guided through the process to create simple paper circuitry using only copper tape, a coin cell battery, a light-emitting diode (LED) and small electronic components such as a LilyPad Button Board. Making light-up greeting cards with paper circuitry is great way to teach the basics of how circuits function while giving students an outlet to express their artistic creativity.

This activity is designed to give students an understanding of one aspect of what an engineer does and the ability to experience various steps in the engineering design process as it relates to a 3D printing task. Students transform into engineers as they work in teams to carry out a 3D printing task by using a blunt-tip needle syringe to print a line using a variety of colored liquid materials (shampoo, conditioner, aloe, and hand sanitizer) into a small plastic box filled with a gel base. Approximating the work of engineers, the teams observe the interactions between the printed material and the gel base at intervals of 10 minutes and iterate, or change, the ink base as necessary to achieve a goal. Using the dye to color the ink allows students to determine which material will permeate or diffuse throughout the base more effectively. Teams share their results to compare with their classmates. A real-world application for this investigation would be when engineers conduct research to develop new medicines, the goal is for the medicine to make its way through the body in the most effective way so that the body can heal.

Students explore the physical science behind the causes of quicksand and become familiar with relationship between concepts such as total stress, pore pressure, and effective stress. Students also relate these concepts to soil liquefaction—a major concern during earthquakes. Students begin the activity by designing a simple device to test the effects of quicksand on materials of different densities and weights. They prototype a support structure that works to prevent a heavy object from sinking into quicksand. At the end of the activity, students reflect on the engineering design process and consider the steps civil engineers take in designing sturdy buildings and other structures.

Students practice human-centered design by imagining, designing and prototyping a product to improve classroom accessibility for the visually impaired. To begin, they wear low-vision simulation goggles (or blindfolds) and walk with canes to navigate through a classroom in order to experience what it feels like to be visually impaired. Student teams follow the steps of the engineering design process to formulate their ideas, draw them by hand and using free, online Tinkercad software, and then 3D-print (or construct with foam core board and hot glue) a 1:20-scale model of the classroom that includes the product idea and selected furniture items. Teams use a morphological chart and an evaluation matrix to quantitatively compare and evaluate possible design solutions, narrowing their ideas into one final solution to pursue. To conclude, teams make posters that summarize their projects.

Many of today's popular sports are based around the use of balls, yet none of the balls are completely alike. In fact, they are all designed with specific characteristics in mind and are quite varied. Students investigate different balls' abilities to bounce and represent the data they collect graphically.

Given a hypothetical civil engineering scenario, student pairs are tasked to apply their knowledge of the rock cycle, rock types, rock weathering and the engineering design process to model a potential method to create a sandy beach from three rocky island shorelines. For their abrasion weathering models, they use wide-mouth lidded jars and three types of candies that serve as the testing “rocks.” They simulate both low- and high-energy weathering environments. After completing the simple weathering techniques and analyzing their observations of the results, they conclude by recommending to the island developer which rocky shoreline would be the easiest, simplest, and most cost-effective from which to create a sandy beach. A worksheet and pre/post quiz are provided.

Students employ the full engineering design process to research and design prototypes that could be used to solve the loss of sea turtle life during a hurricane. During Hurricane Irma, Florida lost a large proportion of its sea turtle nests. Protecting these nests from natural disasters or even human influence is an essential component of conservation in Florida, since only one hatchling in every thousand survives to adulthood. In this activity, students learn about sea turtle nesting behaviors and environmental impacts of hurricanes. Students work collaboratively to build structures that could protect a single sea turtle nest, or an entire beach, in the event of a hurricane or other similar weather disaster. Then, students present their solutions to concerned stakeholders. As an optional extension, students can build prototypes using 3D printers or 3D pens.

Students learn about STEM education through an engineering design challenge that focuses on improving building materials used in shantytowns. First, they consider the factors that lead to shantytown development. After researching the implications of living in shantytowns, students design, build and test cement-based concrete block composites made of discarded and/or recycled materials. The aim is to make a material that is resistant to degradation by chemicals or climate, can withstand natural disasters, and endure through human-made conditions (such as urban overcrowding or pollution). The composites must be made of materials that are inexpensive and readily available so that they are viable alternative in shantytown communities. Students assess the results both chemically and physically and then iterate their designs with the materials that proved to be strongest.

Students are tasked with designing a special type of hockey stick for a sled hockey team—a sport designed for individuals with physical disabilities to play ice hockey. Using the engineering design process, students act as material engineers to create durable hockey sticks using a variety of materials. The stick designs will contain different interior structures that can hold up during flexure (or bending) tests. Following flexure testing, the students can use their results to iterate upon their design and create a second stick.

A cost-benefit analysis is a good way to weigh the costs and the benefits and compare them to see if the decisions being made are sound and worthwhile. For a hypothetical solar farm design problem, students are given a solar cost-benefit analysis sheet to complete within groups. They weigh the expense and benefits of two types of solar panels (with different costs, wattage outputs and land impacts), consider the cost of using the acreage for solar (which removes it from ranching use), and explain why they consider the panel combination they propose to be best. If the costs outweigh the benefits, then a project is not worth doing. On the other hand, if the benefits outweigh the costs, then it is worth implementing the plan.

Students are introduced to two real-life problems that can be solved by using the engineering design process. For the first one, they follow along with a slide presentation that describes how a group of students built an organizer to help organize their teacher’s desk. The presentation introduces students to the key steps in the engineering design process. Next, in discussion groups, they read through a scenario in which middle school student Marisol struggles to keep her locker organized. They read the case study together, stopping and discussing at key points to share ideas and consider Marisol’s progress as she moves through the engineering design cycle to design and implement a solution. As an optional hands-on activity extension, students construct their own locker organizer using scrap materials. This introduction to the engineering design process sets up students to be able to conduct their own real-world design projects. A case study handout, group leader discussion sheet and slide presentation are provided.

Student pairs design, build and test model vehicles capable of rolling down a ramp and then coasting freely as far as possible. The challenge is to make the vehicles entirely out of dry pasta using only adhesive (such as hot glue) to hold the components together. Creativity is encouraged and different types of pasta are provided to support different functions such as round pasta for wheels and sheet pasta for the chassis. Students become familiar with the concepts of gravitational potential energy, kinetic energy and rolling resistance. Teams follow the steps of the engineering design process as they design, test and redesign their small-sized vehicles, working within the project's material constraints. The winner of the competitive final event is the pasta car that travels the longest distance beyond the bottom of the ramp.

As if they are engineers, students are tasked to design solar-powered model vehicles that are speedy and compact in order to make recommendations to a local car sales company. Teams familiarize themselves with the materials by building solar-panel model car prototypes, following kit instructions, which they test for speed. After making design improvements, they test again. Then they take measurements and calculate the volume of each team’s vehicle. They rank all teams’ vehicles by speed and by size. After data analyses, reflection and team discussion, students write recommendations to the car company about the vehicle they think is best for consumers. Youngsters experience key portions of the engineering design process and learn the importance of testing and collaborating in order to make better products. Pre/post-quizzes and numerous worksheets and handouts are provided.

Working as if they are engineers aiming to analyze and then improve data collection devices for precision agriculture, students determine how accurate temperature sensors are by comparing them to each other. Teams record soil temperature data during a class period while making changes to the samples to mimic real-world crop conditions—such as the addition of water and heat and the removal of the heat. Groups analyze their collected data by finding the mean, median, mode, and standard deviation. Then, the class combines all the team data points in order to compare data collected from numerous devices and analyze the accuracy of their recording devices by finding the standard deviation of temperature readings at each minute. By averaging the standard deviations of each minute’s temperature reading, students determine the accuracy of their temperature sensors. Students present their findings and conclusions, including making recommendations for temperature sensor improvements.

Playing the role of engineers in collaborations with the marketing and production teams in a chocolate factory, students design a container for a jumbo chocolate bar. The projects constraints mean the container has to be a regular trapezoidal prism. The design has to optimize the material used to construct the container; that is, students have to find the dimensions of the container with the maximum volume possible. After students come up with their design, teams present a final version of the product that includes creative branding and presentation. The problem-solving portion of this project requires students to find a mathematical process to express the multiple variables in the prism’s volume formula as a single variable cubic polynomial function. Students then use technology to determine the value for which this function has a maximum and, with this value, find the prism’s optimal dimensions.

Students act as engineers to solve a hypothetical problem that has occurred in the Swiss Alps due to a seismic event. In research groups, students follow the steps of the engineering design process as teams compete to design and create small-size model sleds that can transport materials to people in distress who are living in the affected town. The sleds need to be able to carry various resources that the citizens need for survival as well as meet other design requirements. Students test their designs and make redesigns to improve their prototypes in order to achieve final working designs. Once the designs and final testing are complete, students create final technical reports.

Students overlay USGS topographic maps into Google Earth’s satellite imagery. By analyzing Denali, a mountain in Alaska, they discover how to use map scales as ratios to navigate maps, and use rates to make sense of contour lines and elevation changes in an integrated GIS software program. Students also problem solve to find potential pathways up a mountain by calculating gradients.

Student teams investigate the migration of small-particle plastic pollution by exposing invertebrates found in water samples from a local lake or river to fluorescent bead fragments in a controlled environment of their own designs. Students begin by reviewing the composition of food webs and considering the ethics of studies on live organisms. In their model microcosms, they set up a food web so as to trace the microbead migration from one invertebrate species to another. Students use blacklights and microscopes to observe and quantify their experimental results. They develop diagrams that explain their investigations—modeling the ecological impacts of microplastics.

In this activity, students explore how trebuchets were used during the Middle Ages to launch projectiles over or through castle walls as well as how they are used today in events such as Punkin’ Chunkin’. Students work as teams of engineers and research how to design and build their own trebuchets from scratch while following a select number of constraints. They test their trebuchets, evaluate their results through several quantitative analyses, and present their results and design process to the class.

Students take what they know about materials, optical properties and electrons to the next level—to see how semiconductors can be used to augment light. First, they learn how light-emitting diodes (LEDs) work, which helps them to think critically about a real-world problem they are asked to solve later in the activity as if they are practicing engineers. The challenge: To design an improved LED headlight that lights the roadway without distracting oncoming drivers and passengers with the harsh, bright white light seen in many cars today. Students research the problem via an online video, article and interactive simulation, learning all about quantum dots. Then teams use small LED flashlights and pieces of red, blue, yellow and green acetate to independently experiment to come up with a model that has the potential to improve the measured visual quality of bright white LED light—their solutions to the headlight challenge.