A Rube Goldberg® machine stalls.
Carry out an investigation that explores how energy can move from place to place and be transferred in various ways.
Bowling pins can fall even if the ball doesn't touch them directly.
Click here for NGSS standards.
Use this optional assessment if students need support to understand that observations can produce data as evidence, that within a system, moving objects contain energy, that the faster the object moves, the more energy it has, and that energy can be moved from place to place by moving objects.
Part I | 20 minutes |
Part II | 30 minutes |
Part III | 20 minutes |
Part IV | 20 minutes |
(Note: These supplies are also used in Lesson 3: Collisions and Speed.)
The chain reaction must contain two contact forces. A simple example is a marble hits a domino that hits another domino. A marble hits (energy transfer) a marble and then hits a domino. Encourage students to be as complex as they want!
Use students’ answers to Steps 9 and 10 to look for gaps in understanding. Ask probing questions during Part III to help students refine their thinking.
Data discussions are held after students have an opportunity to collect data. These discussions connect the investigation question with data. In this lesson, most of the student data will be qualitative. In data discussions, students grapple with discrepant or anomalous data, identify data that can serve as evidence to support a claim, and link data to a representation. During this discussion, students compare and contrast data collected by different groups in order to discuss similarities and differences in their findings.
For more information about Talk Science and the discussion types, visit https://inquiryproject.terc.edu/shared/pd/TalkScience_Primer.pdf or https://inquiryproject.terc.edu/shared/pd/cc/DiscussionTypes.pdf
At this point in the lesson, content reading should be embedded. If you do not have access to the recommended book, a different book or article that contains pictures with examples of energy transfer (moving from one place to another or moving from one object to another) can be used instead.
Use student answers to assess understanding.
ESRs:
Energy transfers between objects. I can observe changes in the system as evidence that energy was transferred.
This morning when I walked to school, I opened the door and closed the door. When I got to the corner, I pressed the button for the walk light, and the walk light changed to green.
In the video we watched
(Audri’s Rube Goldberg Monster Trap), the boy pushed the dominoes, which made the bowling pin fall, pushing the gyroscope to make the marker top push the marble down the spiral tube, into the straight tube. When the marble hit the toaster switch the energy was moved by electrical current to heat which pushed the lever up.Blayze, J. (2013, May 4). 2 Kids, One Dream: The PBA Tour 3 & 7 Year Old Bowling Prodigy DJ aka Little Norm Duke & JEM. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Eb_NVjFah0
Phelan, G. Key Concepts: Energy Basics (2014 ed.). Sally Ride Science.
TERC. (n.d.). Four Discussion Types. Retrieved from https://inquiryproject.terc.edu/shared/pd/cc/DiscussionTypes.pdf
Stem Teaching Tools. (n.d.). Talk Science Printable. Retrieved from http://stemteachingtools.org/assets/landscapes/TalkSciencePrintable.pdf
RUBE GOLDBERG® is a registered trademark of Rube Goldberg, Inc. All materials used with permission. rubegoldberg.com