After a family plane ride to Phoenix and a work flight for me, my son has been curious about airplanes. What makes them work and gives them the ability to fly through the air?
Fortuitously, my son also just received a model glider kit for Christmas. I eagerly "helped" him put it together (i.e. he watched me put it together) and we tested flying it around the house. Note, the kit was designed for age 8+.
Here is an example of how we followed the scientific method during our build and test:
Step 1 - Research - how do airplanes work? The glider kit came with a little booklet that explained basic aerodynamics (ie fluid dynamics of air). Bernoullis' principle demonstrates that the faster fluids move, the lower their pressure. The Lift force pushes the airplane up when air flows over the wings. (Lift is always perpendicular to the direction of the airflow.)
Step 2 - Define a problem - How do we make an airplane/glider that flies across the room? How do we maintain the airflow across the wings to create the lift force long enough before it falls?
Step 3 - Form hypothesis/design test model - The glider kit gave us several sample designs to try. The main one had slightly curved wings, extending in series from the body of the plane, as well as stablizers in the back.
Step 4 - Test. Test flights are the best part of any model airplane/glider experiment. Sometimes the experiments went well and the glider went across the room and sometimes it nosedived almost immediately. Either scenario was greeted with shrieks of surprise and delight from my 4 year old. The test and experimentation phase is usually the most rewarding of any scientific process. It gives you the chance to get hands on and see success...or at least break something.
Step 5 - Analyze results and repeat from Step 2. Crashes were the most exciting part of the experiments, but then we had to adjust our design and try again. Do we need to start from a different spot in the house (top of the stairs)? Should we move the wings forward or back to balance the weight? Did we break a piece and need to re-evaluate the design?
Final step - review what we learned. After we finished our test runs (and it was time for bed) we talked about what worked best and why. We noticed that if the wings were too far back, the nose was too heavy and it would crash. We noticed that if the wings were at an angle, it made the plane turn. We also looked forward in the booklet to see what we might want to build next time.
Overall, it was a fun experiment. Now I am motivated to look for some basic paper airplane suggestions on Pinterest, that we can test without as much destruction. We can build several models and determine the best design for maximum distance, hang time, and speed.
(see my Pinterest pics After a family plane ride to Phoenix and a work flight for me, my son has been curious about airplanes. What makes them work and gives them the ability to fly through the air?
Fortuitously, my son also just received a model glider kit for Christmas. I eagerly "helped" him put it together (i.e. he watched me put it together) and we tested flying it around the house. Note, the kit was designed for age 8+.
Here is an example of how we followed the scientific method during our build and test:
Step 1 - Research - how do airplanes work? The glider kit came with a little booklet that explained basic aerodynamics (ie fluid dynamics of air). Bernoullis' principle demonstrates that the faster fluids move, the lower their pressure. The Lift force pushes the airplane up when air flows over the wings. (Lift is always perpendicular to the direction of the airflow.)
Step 2 - Define a problem - How do we make an airplane/glider that flies across the room? How do we maintain the airflow across the wings to create the lift force long enough before it falls?
Step 3 - Form hypothesis/design test model - The glider kit gave us several sample designs to try. The main one had slightly curved wings, extending in series from the body of the plane, as well as stablizers in the back.
Step 4 - Test. Test flights are the best part of any model airplane/glider experiment. Sometimes the experiments went well and the glider went across the room and sometimes it nosedived almost immediately. Either scenario was greeted with shrieks of surprise and delight from my 4 year old. The test and experimentation phase is usually the most rewarding of any scientific process. It gives you the chance to get hands on and see success...or at least break something.
Step 5 - Analyze results and repeat from Step 2. Crashes were the most exciting part of the experiments, but then we had to adjust our design and try again. Do we need to start from a different spot in the house (top of the stairs)? Should we move the wings forward or back to balance the weight? Did we break a piece and need to re-evaluate the design?
Final step - review what we learned. After we finished our test runs (and it was time for bed) we talked about what worked best and why. We noticed that if the wings were too far back, the nose was too heavy and it would crash. We noticed that if the wings were at an angle, it made the plane turn. We also looked forward in the booklet to see what we might want to build next time.
Overall, it was a fun experiment. Now I am motivated to look for some basic paper airplane suggestions on Pinterest, that we can test without as much destruction. We can build several models and determine the best design for maximum distance, hang time, and speed.
After a family plane ride to Phoenix and a work flight for me, my son has been curious about airplanes. What makes them work and gives them the ability to fly through the air?
Fortuitously, my son also just received a model glider kit for Christmas. I eagerly "helped" him put it together (i.e. he watched me put it together) and we tested flying it around the house. Note, the kit was designed for age 8+.
Here is an example of how we followed the scientific method during our build and test:
Step 1 - Research - how do airplanes work? The glider kit came with a little booklet that explained basic aerodynamics (ie fluid dynamics of air). Bernoullis' principle demonstrates that the faster fluids move, the lower their pressure. The Lift force pushes the airplane up when air flows over the wings. (Lift is always perpendicular to the direction of the airflow.)
Step 2 - Define a problem - How do we make an airplane/glider that flies across the room? How do we maintain the airflow across the wings to create the lift force long enough before it falls?
Step 3 - Form hypothesis/design test model - The glider kit gave us several sample designs to try. The main one had slightly curved wings, extending in series from the body of the plane, as well as stablizers in the back.
Step 4 - Test. Test flights are the best part of any model airplane/glider experiment. Sometimes the experiments went well and the glider went across the room and sometimes it nosedived almost immediately. Either scenario was greeted with shrieks of surprise and delight from my 4 year old. The test and experimentation phase is usually the most rewarding of any scientific process. It gives you the chance to get hands on and see success...or at least break something.
Step 5 - Analyze results and repeat from Step 2. Crashes were the most exciting part of the experiments, but then we had to adjust our design and try again. Do we need to start from a different spot in the house (top of the stairs)? Should we move the wings forward or back to balance the weight? Did we break a piece and need to re-evaluate the design?
Final step - review what we learned. After we finished our test runs (and it was time for bed) we talked about what worked best and why. We noticed that if the wings were too far back, the nose was too heavy and it would crash. We noticed that if the wings were at an angle, it made the plane turn. We also looked forward in the booklet to see what we might want to build next time.
Overall, it was a fun experiment. Now I am motivated to look for some basic paper airplane suggestions on Pinterest, that we can test without as much destruction. We can build several models and determine the best design for maximum distance, hang time, and speed.
(See my Pinterest pics http://www.pinterest.com/mymomsanenginr/kid-science/).
