- Water Tight Buildings
We started off as a class, by coming up with tons of world problems. They went from terrorism all the way to sharknadoes. Then, we broke into groups and chose one world problem to solve. Our group chose tsunamis and more specifically protecting people from them. We started by coming up with possible solutions to tsunamis. We got about 15-20 solutions and then we narrowed it down to one. Our solution was to make a secure building to evacuate into and to have pressure sensors to alarm when a tsunami was coming, due to a large receding of the ocean line before a tsunami.
Then we started researching exactly what our problem was. We looked at damages caused by tsunamis, how often they occur and when, and lots more things. We researched a lot about the tsunami recently in Japan and the impacts of that, so our audience could relate to our problem. A special thing we researched about the tsunami in Japan was the damage of the nuclear power plants that were destroyed.
Now that we had some research we went ahead and worked on our power-point presentation. We planned out every slide we might need and then started putting it together. Half-way through though, we found we needed to research more about our problem. So we got some more info and then finished our power-point presentation. We also made a prototype of our solution by making a wooden frame and surrounding it with tinfoil, to act as the water proof exterior of our actual building.
Here's our power-point:
tsunami_protection_program.pptx | |
File Size: | 1417 kb |
File Type: | pptx |
For this project we didn't really use any major physics concepts, but we did use the engineering design cycle a whole ton. The design cycle goes as follows:
We more or less followed this format for our project. We definitely stalled on the researching part, trying to get as much info as we could to help us later on with our prototype and power point. After some research we followed the engineering design cycle, but in the midst of communicating our design, we realized we didn't research enough. So we had to go back and do that again, then we could finish the cycle and we were done with the project.
- Research the Problem
- Develop Solutions
- Select Solution
- Construct Prototype
- Test and Evaluate Prototype
- Communicate Design
- Re-design
- Repeat
We more or less followed this format for our project. We definitely stalled on the researching part, trying to get as much info as we could to help us later on with our prototype and power point. After some research we followed the engineering design cycle, but in the midst of communicating our design, we realized we didn't research enough. So we had to go back and do that again, then we could finish the cycle and we were done with the project.
This project was really fun and I think it went pretty well. We practiced our presentation a lot so we knew what we would say and when, which turned out great. I think we also did really well with researching a lot and getting good information into our power point. We could have improved our researching as well, though, because we did it in chunks, thinking that we had enough when we didn't. We didn't manage our time very well either, and ended up staying after school to finish, so that needs improvement as well.