August 3, 2005

The class picked up where they had left of yesterday by continuing to work on their straw and cup towers. As the testing deadline approached, the students completed their finishing touches. During the testing the students were very anxious to see who had built the strongest, tallest structure.

Once the competition was over the students began a new activity, Measure to Measure. The students were asked to construct a box and determine how much sand it could hold. Jonathan assigned each of the students a different sized box, which they constructed out of graph paper. After testing their boxes, the students used their results to figure out which dimensions held the most sand. They discovered that the box with the largest volume could hold the most sand. This gave them special insight into the formula for density (Density = Mass / Volume).