Lego's In Action


Setup :

In order to efficently run this lesson, a modest amount of preparation must be made. Gather a fair share of large lego blocks for the students to build with, a stop watch, and reserve a large area such as a parking lot or two rooms to work in.

Next, you as the instructor should create several *pairs* of structures with the lego blocks. There should be a few relatively simple structures consisting of a height of no more than 2. Then the difficulty of the structures should rise and so should their size. Please refer to the tutorials provided here and here and also pictures provided here. There can be some minor variations between the blocks used to create each structure, for example, one structure might use one long piece in a place where the other structure uses two short pieces. Another good variation is to have MOST of the blocks in the structure be the same color, except for one or two. After construction, one of the two structures is disassembled and the pieces provided to one of the student teams.


Introduction :

When you are about to begin the activity make sure that the class has an overview of how the activity will be conducted. Then you will need to place students into two groups: group A and group B. Then have those groups break into halves: one half of the group will be the describers and the other half will be the builders.

The Activity :

  • Take both groups of describers into one room and both building groups into the other. Give each of the describer groups the first lego structure and each of the builder groups the same legos as in the built lego structure but disassembled.
  • The describers should examine their structures carefully.
  • Each group is to send a runner into the hallway. The describer from group A has 45 seconds to attempt to describe the architecture of their lego structure to the builder from group A. Likewise with the members from group B.
  • After 45 seconds the runners should return to their respective groups. It is now up to the builder runner to attempt to relay the information to the rest of the group and begin replicating the other structure. Give another 45 seconds to the groups trying to replicate and then send the second set of runners to the hallway.
  • Repeat this process 5 times with a different runner each time (if there are not five runners in each group then some will go twice).
  • At the end of 5 rounds, compare structures to see if it is built correctly.
  • Try the entire process again with a more complicated structure.
  • As a class, discuss some of the difficulties involved with the process.

Questions to Discuss :
  1. When did you notice that there were minor variations between the structures? Had you made particular assumptions about your building conditions?
  2. Did it take long for the describing group to realize it was just as important for them to listen as well as talk?
  3. Did your group establish a terminology for describing the lego pieces?
  4. Were there any strategies in particular that made this activity easier as you went along?
  5. What is the similarity between this activity and when scientists use models/graphs/data in describing various phenomena (such as studying galaxies, pollution, chemistry)?







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