Locally in Coventry and Warwickshire we have developed the following
Challenges In A Box for school teachers to use to
assist in educating pupils of various ages. We are keen to have feedback and
new ideas for these challenges.
Each challenge has visual aids and, where relevant, pupil guides and
teacher guides.
Challenges In A Box are copyright © Derrick
Willer.
However you are free to copy for use in
schools and for instructing children of school age and for use by children of
school age. Please feedback to: Derrick Willer, dw@dwiller.com
However, I suggest that you give a small donation (e.g. £25, $30) to the Memusi
Schools in remote Kenya so that they can install electricity and then get
computers.
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/electricity Thank you.
Title |
Description
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Download |
Anemometer |
Make an Anemometer out
of some plastic sheets, a dowel, a pin and a heavy
base |
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Animals in Danger |
Ten examples of
endangered animals. What are they? Where do they live? What do the eat? And
What is the danger? |
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Arithmetic Bricks |
Sum Fun
with Arithmetic Bricks. Learn addition, subtraction, multiplication,
division, squares, pythagoras and Pi using bricks.
Suitable for ages 5-8. |
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Arithmetic Bricks For Five
Year Olds |
Sum Fun
with Arithmetic Bricks. Learn addition, subtraction, multiplication,
division, squares, pythagoras and Pi using bricks.
Suitable for ages 5-8. |
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Balloon Car |
Make a car powered by a balloon
from recycled materials |
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Bridges |
A paper based exercise suitable for 7-13 year old pupils. Pupils make a bridge
out of paper into a U"
shape and find out how much
weight (pennies or model cars) it will take with different depths of the
"U" versus the remaining area for the bridge. They graph the
results. The project is then extended to bridge the gap between
two chairs with
paper, sticky tape, etc. costing
them "money" – e.g. cheapest to hold a 100gm weight wins. (30 mins) |
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Burglar Alarm Primary |
An introduction to electrical
circuits for Primary School pupils, KS2, using low cost
materials. About 30-60 minutes as individuals or small teams. |
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Car Crash |
An exercise to discover that cars
have crumple zones to keep passengers safe from crashes. The pupils are asked to construct
a car from available materials and work out how to protect the passengers and also have crumple zones front and back. |
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Chinese New Year |
This activity is for pupils to
make a rotating table with lights. |
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Clown |
This exercise introduces
pupils to levers by making a dancing clown, robot or
Santa They discover new words
including Mechanical Advantage and Pivot or Fulcrum |
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Compressed Air Car |
Make a model car from
recycled materials and use compressed air to race it across the playground |
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Compressed Air Plane |
Make a model plane from
recycled materials and use compressed air to fly it across the playground |
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Crackers |
This activity is for
pupils to make some Christmas or Party Crackers |
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Diwali |
This activity is for pupils to
make a rotating Dwali table with lights |
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Downhill Racer |
An activity to make a downhill racing
car using a pre-made base and wheels. Pupils can work alone or in
teams. Approximately 1 hour |
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Eco Power Challenge |
This activity is for pupils to
see how they can reduce the carbon footprint of their home. Then to scale this up for their
school. |
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Egg Drop |
Using raw eggs the teams have to make a cradle to hold the egg and
protect the egg when it is dropped from height. For younger ones you may want
to use boiled eggs. Teams should consider safety, strength, crumple zone,
what happens if the cradle turns upside-down, etc. |
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Elecricity Is Fun |
Utilising the AchidistviQ Physics Science Lab Circuit Learning
Electronics Exploration Kit,STEM
Electric Education Tools for Beginner, Junior and Senior High School Pupils |
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Even More Funny Maths |
Apples and bags, twins?
Ladder and tide, Hare and tortoise, Polar Bear. Alien money, and more |
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Festive Season |
Make a party
cracker and decorate it. |
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Festive Season |
Make a
Santa and turn him into a volcano with baking soda and vinegar |
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Using LEDS and electronic components to make an A-Stable Multivibrator
to power flashing LED festive lights |
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Flight |
A paper based
exercise helping 5-13 year olds to understand flight. There are different planes
to be made and different wing arrangements demonstrate how lift affects
flight – canard versus tail-plane, etc. (30 mins) |
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Funny
Maths |
Exploring some unusual
arithmetic, geometry, etc. used by ourselves and, maybe, aliens. Including
Thales Theorem, Hippocrates of Chios, Mesolabe
Compass, multiplying using your hands and unusual multiplication by some
earlier humans. Years 5 and 6. |
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Gaia |
Gaia is the idea that
living organisms on a planet will affect the nature of their environment. Can
the pupils list some of the problems and their possible solutions? |
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Helicopter |
Elastic
band helicopter made from paper and paper clips |
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House Of Gadgets |
For 9 - 13 year
olds. An exercise to understand sustainability and conservation.
Pupils imagine what will happen if rubbish is not collected. Then there is a
short story about conservation. The pupils decide on a gadget to make and are
given recycled materials to make a mock-up of it. (2½-3 hours) |
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Japanese Multiplication |
The Japanese method of
multiplying two two-digit numbers is to do this by drawing lines. |
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Lets Crumble |
Learn how to programme the
Crumble computer. Then make a night-light or automated money-box
using the Crumble kit and recycled materials. There are further challenges
for traffic lights, car and maze, robot. Developed with DATA |
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Lets Be Specific About Gravity |
Several samples to weigh and
measure their volume using a graduated test-tube or jug. Plus
you can add your own samples – maybe pebble, concrete, plastic, potato,
carrot, cheese |
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Levers and Pulleys |
Levers with up to ten to one
mechanical advantage, and visa versa. One to four
pulleys with up to four-to-one mechanical advantage. |
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Magic Roundabout |
Make a
roundabout from recycled cardboard, paper and wooden
dowel. Decorate if for a festival or party. |
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Make a Barometer |
Make a barometer using
a jam jar and a record on graph paper |
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Make a Thermometer |
Make a thermometer out
of a drinks bottle, a straw, alcohol and water. |
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Measure Wind Speed |
Make an anemometer and
measure wind speed. Compare to weather forecasts to obtain a conversion
factor between revolutions per minute and published wind speed. |
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More Funny Maths |
Triangles, marbles,
weighing, always 1089, letters represent numbers, odd x even = ? and more |
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More Tricky Logic |
Ten more questions where
the logic may not be obvious. |
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Paper Catapult Primary |
A version of the secondary school
challenge for primary school pupils where the design is limited
and a recommended design is used. |
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Paper Towers And Bridges |
Versions for Primary and
Secondary Schools. Approx. 30 – 60 minutes. Secondary school pupils in teams are
judged on design, budgets, actual spend, and presentations. |
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An activity with a tennis ball and a cricket ball to demonstrate
pendulums and calculate their swing-time. Finally testing the formula with a
playground swing. |
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Polyalphabetic Coding |
How to Code and Decode using your
Birthdate so you can send secret messages. KS2 and KS3. About 30-60 minutes
as individuals or small teams. |
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Primary Quick Challenges |
Four sets of 13 (Baker’s Dozen)
challenges each taking 5-10 minutes. |
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Make a sailing boat out of recycled materials |
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Rockets
and Maths |
Make a rocket
and throw it horizontally and vertically and calculate the average velocity
using Newton’s laws of motion. |
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Roundabout |
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Sail A Matchbox |
Make a boat out of a matchbox and
pencils and sail it with a hand-held fan |
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Singing Maths |
Pictures
and rhymes leading to simple arithmetic Suitable
for 5-8 year olds, these include Sum Fun with Jack
And Jill, Grand Old Duke of York, and Contrary Mary |
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Spectroscopy |
Make a spectroscope out of
cardboard box and a CD. Approx. 30 minutes. Suitable for Primary Schools |
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STEM Quiz |
24 questions to tease the pupils,
teachers and STEM Ambassadors complete with "Wrong" with
explanation and the correct answers |
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Sum Pi to Chew Over |
Not pork pie, ∏
≃ 3.142 or 22/7. Calculating circumference, area
and volume |
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Sum Prime |
Sum Prime Numbers. Suitable for
ages 5-8. |
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Table Tennis Ball Launcher |
An education challenge.
We have 12 kits available for use in schools in Coventry and Warwickshire.
(30 mins for basic launcher kit – up to 1½ hours for loader for the launcher
made from recycled materials provided by the school) Email Derrick Willer dw@dwiller.com for
availability. |
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The Water Cycle |
An experiment to show
the water cycle – evaporation and condensation. |
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Thermometer |
This activity is for pupils
to discover how a thermometer works. |
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Towers and Bridges Made With
Sweeties |
Primary challenge, approx. 20-40
minutes. Make a Tower or Bridge out of either Marsh Mallows and Straws or Jelly Beans and Toothpicks |
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Tricky Logic |
Ten questions where the
logic may not be obvious. |
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Vinegar Rocket |
Make a rocket from a
plastic bottle using vinegar and baking soda. |
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Water
Clock |
Make a clock
that uses water to time 30 seconds, etc. |
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Water
Wheel Light |
Make a water
wheel drive a generator to light an LED |
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Why Lag Your House? |
A simple card
based exercise for younger pupils to learn how insulating your home
can improve heating and save on energy. Suitable for pupils aged 5-13. (60
mins) |
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Win
A Car |
There are
three closed doors. You can win a car if you open the correct door. The host
opens one door which is empty, Should you change
your chosen door for a greater possibility of winning? This activity is for pupils to understand
probability |
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