It was a sunny, windy afternoon in March when a Discovery Group of fourth grade students from Prairie View Elementary stepped outside with their teacher for a straightforward — yet challenging — experiment: build a contraption to protect an egg from breaking when dropped. The playground equipment wasn’t quite tall enough to truly test what their creations could do. Cue the Eden Prairie Fire Department!
Two bright red fire engines sat just outside the school, waiting to load up the students’ inventions. A firefighter accompanied the contraptions up to the top of a raised ladder (which went as high as 60 feet!) and dropped them one at a time, to the fourth graders’ delight. They jumped up and down, and one even asked if he’d win a billion dollars if his egg survived. No, Ms. Primeau laughed, “but I appreciate your enthusiasm!”
Each of the students, part of a Discovery Group about design strategies and testing, was enchanted with the process as they watched their eggs float down from the fire truck ladder. When all the eggs had been dropped, the students rushed over to see the results. Their hard work had paid off: Parachutes were a popular tactic for protecting the eggs, and between the height of the ladder and the breeze, many chutes caught the wind! This smart engineering choice brought the eggs to a gentler landing. Some eggs had broken, but many had survived! It was a lesson in the real-world application of scientific ideas and a memory we hope these young designers keep with them. Way to get fired up about physics, Eagles!
- Prairie View Elementary
