PE GUIDES THE FORMATION OF THE CULMINATING ACTIVITY Based on that Performance Expectation and our current standards we designed the Culminating Activity: Students will design/construct a car that is able to complete the designed track(or course)that includes one large hill and a subsequent smaller hill to evaluate the effectiveness of their car (including speed, forces acting on the car, etc.)

LESSON WE’RE GOING TO PREVIEW Lesson 1 Zip-line Activity Lesson 2 Car Design Lesson 7 Uphill Climb Lesson 9 Culminating Activity

**LESSON 1 ZIP-LINE ACTIVITY** Purpose of Lesson: Engagement Intro to forces and motion Intro to basic engineering principles Framing the lesson Students are working together at a large engineering firm and have been approached by the city of Los Angeles to build a mass transit vehicle from downtown LA to the local beaches

LESSON 1 ZIP-LINE T4T ACTIVITY Challenge1 - Working in pairs, use the following materials to design a transportation device that is able to transport a mass (4 Pen ends) 10 m in the fastest possible time. Materials: Fishing line, Straw(small, medium, large), Balloon, tape, binder clip, 4 pen ends, stopwatch Challenge 2- using the same materials, try to get your vehicle to travel the furthest possible distance Challenger 3- try using a different type of balloons to see how they impact speed and/ or distance

LESSON 1: ZIP-LINE Share out the discovered rules of building your vehicle

LESSON 1 ZIP-LINE ACTIVITY Debrief on building the transportation device What did you notice about building your vehicle ? What made it more efficient/less efficient? What recommendations could you give your fellow engineers? Make Final Revisions to your Vehicle Record the fastest time

LESSON 1 WRAP UP Students would compare their data to another group that had a different size straw Was there a pattern? If so what was the pattern? Common Core Connections Post-it reflection

LESSON 2 CAR DESIGN Purpose of Lesson: Introduce students to basic building principles of engineering Intro to Calculating/ graphing speed Balanced and Unbalanced forces Free-body diagrams Framing the lesson One alternative to the Zip-line is to utilize existing transit infrastructure and to use a mass transit vehicle Instead of a zip-line we have been asked to create a road vehicle that focuses on one of three categories

LESSON 2 CAR DESIGN Students design concept cars and/or blue prints for their ideas Challenge: Working in pairs, students are given only the materials to build a self propelled “stock” car and must be able to travel a specific distance Boards(Small, medium, or large), binder clips, single balloon, bottle caps, tape, hot glue, dowels, straws Students may build a vehicle that is oriented toward… Speed Safety Number of Passengers

LESSON 2 CAR DESIGN Students are introduced to the Engineering cycle DesignBuildTestRevise

LESSON 2 Once students have started to build and begun to test there vehicles, regroup to share out observations and any revisions the groups have made Share out the discovered rules of building the car

LESSON 2 FOLLOW UP DISCUSSION Teacher leads a discussion on how we can measure the performance of their cars “What do we need to measure, how can we measure it, how can we record and communicate our results?” “What was the cause of the motion, where did it come from, how can we quantify and communicate that?”

LESSON 2 WRAP UP Review of worksheet Strategies used Post-it reflection

LESSON 3: INVESTIGATION SPEED Purpose of Lesson Students will calculate/ graph average speed Compare and contrast data Intro to Kinetic Energy How do you measure speed? What factors affect speed? Framing the Lesson Students will be using the Engineering cycle to revise their cars and get them to perform at their optimum level The data is used to calculate average speed and then is graphed One of the main goals of creating this transit system is for it to be as fast as possible

LESSON 4: INVESTIGATION: VARYING MASS Purpose of Lesson: Intro to mass and the impact it has on speed Students use graphs to extrapolate the relationship between mass and speed Intro to F=MA Measuring the impact of one variable by measuring another How does adding mass impact acceleration? Framing the lesson Using the cars they have built students will add mass to their vehicles and measure the speed, students try three different masses In addition to being as fast as possible, the carrying capacity is another factor students may build for

LESSON 5: VARYING FORCE Purpose of Lesson: Further elaboration on F=MA As force is increased what should happen to the acceleration Students measure and graph speed to extrapolate the relationship between force and acceleration How does adding more force impact acceleration? Framing the Lesson: One of the major reasons why we are creating a mass transit system is to eliminate pollution, therefore we must find the most efficient amount of force to apply to the vehicle Forces interact with each other, as a result balloons may start to interfere with one another

LESSON 6: DOWNHILL INVESTIGATION Purpose of Lesson: Intro to potential to kinetic energy The impact of gravity and mass What impact does gravity have on a vehicle traveling down a hill? Framing the Lesson: Many of the roads in Los Angeles are not perfectly level, and as a result this may impact the fuel efficiency of the vehicle.

LESSON 6: DOWNHILL INVESTIGATION Setting up the Downhill ramp The use of the downhill ramp to show how the potential energy is converted to kinetic The limit of the kinetic energy is limited to the amount of potential energy, which is determined by the incline of the ramp

**LESSON 7 UPHILL CLIMB** Purpose of Lesson Students are introduced to potential energy and its relationship with kinetic energy How can energy be transferred from kinetic to potential energy? Framing the Lesson Students are asked to take into account the road conditions all across California Are roads always flat or there bumps, hills, and other problems?

LESSON 7 UPHILL CLIMB Challenge Students are given three different inclines and measure the speed their vehicles are able to obtain while traveling over the hill. For our purposes only one incline will be used, the severe incline. Outcome Students are able to show where potential energy is the highest/ where kinetic energy is lost

LESSON 7 UPHILL CLIMB Share out the discovered rules of building

LESSON 7 WRAP UP Review of worksheet Strategies used Post-it reflection

LESSON 8: CAR COLLISIONS Purpose of Lesson: Directly address the PE we are focusing on Students plan an investigation to see how collisions impact motion Investigation into balanced and unbalanced forces Framing the Lesson: Based on PhET simulations and applying their knowledge of forces, students will plan how they can test the safety of their vehicle and give it a rating.

CAR COLLISIONS lab lab This allows students to see how mass and velocity factor into a collision Based on their observations students must plan how to rate their How would you plan an investigation to assign a safety rating?

CAR COLLISIONS Josh and Geoff’s investigation Stock car with mass that can be added or subtracted A ramp set to a decline that is held constant Students place car at the end of the ramp and measure how far their car travels after the collision, the smaller the distance traveled, the higher the safety rating

**LESSON 9 CAR COURSE** Purpose of Lesson Culminating Task Framing the Lesson This is the final test of the vehicles you have created, the results of this test will be used in your write up to explain how well your car is able to perform.

LESSON 9 CAR COURSE Students calculate the total average speed for running the entire course, to goal is to travel at the highest speed Once students have run all of their trials they are expected to compile all of their investigations and complete a write up

LESSON 9 WRITE UP Using all of the data from the prior investigations, students write a proposal or create a pamphlet as to why their vehicle should be chosen by the City of Los Angeles Students must include Summary of cars overall performance Explanation as to why their car performed the way it did Explanation is supported by their data What materials were used to build their car Possible problems/ challenges and solutions Considerations and implications for the future Reflection on the design process