When teaching high school students, it’s important to capture their attention with creative and adventurous lessons. This is especially true for physics classes, where students often get overwhelmed by the math-centric nature of the material.
Fortunately, many fun engineering challenges for high school students will make your physics lessons more enjoyable. Whether your students are aspiring engineers or need the credit to graduate, these hands-on projects will stimulate their minds and spark their curiosity.
Bridge-Building Challenge
Grab some fantastic bridge-building kits for schools, and put your student’s engineering skills to the test! Challenge them to construct a sturdy bridge that withstand the most weight. This activity will teach your students about structural engineering and allow them to have fun completing a hands-on challenge with friends.
Egg Drop Challenge
Have your students design a contraption that protects a raw egg from breaking when dropped from a reasonable height. This classic challenge teaches students about impact forces and materials science. Through this challenge, your students can unlock their creativity and apply physics lessons in a competitive and safe environment.
Paper Airplane Challenge
Fold, tweak, and launch! The paper airplane challenge is a fun way to explore aerodynamics. Your students can experiment with different designs and learn how wing shape, size, and weight distribution affect flight. They can compete with their friends to see whose paper plane can fly the farthest or perform the coolest stunts!
Rube Goldberg Machines
Rude Golberg machines are simple contraptions that use a chain reaction to complete a task. Your students are probably most familiar with domino chains, where knocking over the first domino causes the rest to crash into one another. Your students can enjoy a fun day in the classroom by attempting to create their own Rube Goldberg machine! They will get a kick out of figuring out how to chain together a series of actions.
Introducing these fun engineering challenges to your high school students can make your physics class fun and help your students use the information they learn. Who knows, they might even discover a passion for the subject and decide to pursue a career in this exciting field!
If you want educational kits for your physics class, head to our website and review our inventory. At Midwest Model Supply, we carry a range of fun STEM-focused projects for students, including bridge building, model rockets, and racecar kits. Contact us today if you have any questions about our wholesale educational kits for students.