Marshmallow Structure ...What?!

Often when students meet the teacher for the first time, it's a lot of discussion...a getting to know each other...not in Mrs. Erikson's science classes.  Don't get me wrong, they do get to know each other...and walk out with a good idea of who Mrs. Erikson is simply by the team building experiment that the students have to do.

Their challenge: create the tallest tower that has a base of 10 centimeters by 10 centimeters and it must stand for 60 seconds before we can measure it.  The amount of critical thinking skills, collaboration and cooperation was evident from the start.  Each team was given 2 marshmallows, lots of spaghetti and two rulers (one to measure the base and the other the structure).  Added to the difficulty level was the fact that the room temperature had to be around 90 degrees Fairenheit which meant that the marshmallows were gooey.  

The first team in her third period class to finish had a solid structure that measured 50 cm.  The others had to beat their structure.  It was like a classic comedy show as the taller the structure, the more is slowly started to lean.  Despite that, we did have a team that won with a coveted 52 centimeters.  Good job everyone!

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