This is the last week of tech, we made levers to replace light switches! It was really fun, we got different pieces and we designed it, then glued them together. I used a drill machine to drill some holes onto the base plate! I put on goggles, then turned the on switch up, I waited for it to get to a steady number (2130), put on a clip so it wouldn’t fly away, then I pushed down the twirly thing on the side. I made two holes, one on each side of the base plate.

This is my favorite tech project because it’s something that I will be able to keep and not something that will just rip or I’ll throw away. Tech was really fun!

This week we made small LED lights light up, this was definitely my favorite project so far! These were the materials I used: wires, LED lights, breadboard (not an actual breadboard), pliers, 9V battery (with different wires). I plugged the battery into the breadboard, I put the other wires in the correct spaces and put the LED lights in the same row as the wires. They lit up! I took a photo and submitted it to the assignment, I didn’t take it apart yet and left it on my desk.

Later, I moved the wire to the other column (the negative column that my battery wire was in). It might a little sound and the lights went out. I went to my dad and he told me that I shorted the circuit. At least I had already submitted it.

We made two quick projects this week. The first one was earlier this week, I got a glass and put this paper clip on top and attached some tin foil to it. I got the sleeve of my sweatshirt and rubbed it against a balloon. I put the side where I rubbed the balloon facing towards the paper clip, I made sure that the balloon and paper clip didn’t touch. The foil inside the glass was moving! I thought energy was moving through the air from the balloon.

Today, I completed a Nearpod that had some videos giving information about the ruler we were using. I watched a video on what to do. I got two wires, one grey, one red, and cut off the tips of each using pliers. I used a specific part of the pliers so that it would only cut the plastic on top and not the metal core on the inside. I tried cutting the wire end but I couldn’t so I went to my dad, he showed me how to slide it. It was helpful because I was watching it right in front of me. I did it in the end.

This week, we were making cranks, they are a lot like the cams we made last week. When I looked at the instructions, they didn’t look too difficult. There were two sheets again, I cut out the sheet that had one big shape and it had a bit of small cuts that I used a slice cutter for. The second sheet had more smaller shapes but I still used the scissors for this. I started and I got stuck on one of the steps halfway, my dad helped me.

At the end, there was a lot of things that I glued so I waited to put on the last piece of paper. When it dried, I twirled the axle to see if it worked and it broke in the middle! I used tape to put it back together, making sure not to block of anything that was needed to twirl. It still didn’t work so I came to the conclusion that the tape or glue didn’t work/stick or I didn’t glue one of the pieces correctly.

This week I made an automata, a machine. First, I had two sheets of card stock paper that had different shapes on them, I cut them out. Some shapes were big, I used scissors to cut these out, some shapes were smaller and had more detail, I used a slice cutter for this. The black lines were the ones I cut, the dotted line were the ones I folded, and I glued the boxes that had dashed lines. I had to be careful because I didn’t want to cut the lines I was supposed to fold.

I had a sheet of instructions and my teacher posted videos of him making the automata. Each piece was labeled with a number but it was a bit hard to follow. On the last step, I was confused so my dad helped. When I folded the flaps, I had to glue them to stick onto the other side. It was a bit hard to put glue on it. At the end, there was a circle on the side, and to rotate the axle in the middle, I twisted the circle. It was fun to see how an automata helps make many other machines.

This week we are learning about simple machines. So far, we have learned about the lever and the wheel and axe. For the project, we made a lever like a catapult, it surprising took only twenty minutes. It usually takes me about an hour to finish a project. We could choose from a few different levers. Then, there was a video for the one we wanted to make.

I got twelve popsicle sticks, a lid from a bottle, tacky glue, and three elastic bands. First, I took ten of the popsicle sticks and tied them together, then I tied on the part with the lid with elastics. I glued on the lid and left it to dry, I also added some tape because it wasn’t that strong.

I made a video on Flipgrid, I showed my lever and said the measurements. For extra credit, we could make a game, I did. Mine was how far someone could throw the dice. I demonstrated it by being Person A and Person B. Person A threw it further so they won. This was a fun project.

We made a truss today, a truss is a structure that has triangles in it. With triangles, a structure is more stable. I made mine out of 20 toothpicks and 8 carrots, it was in a cube shape. When building it, I first made the toothpicks into a cube, then I inserted toothpicks diagonally to make triangles. They weren’t long enough so I taped two together, overlapping.

Then I tested it, I got a few books and placed my truss in a place where it wouldn’t fall. I thought it would last about seven books but it only lasted four. On the third book, it began to wobble, on the fourth, it started denting. When I placed the fifth book on top, it crashed. One of the toothpicks fell off and then it fell into the side.

It was a bit disappointing that it only lasted four books but it was fun to make!

This week we made beams out of cardboard! Mr Calvert, our technology teacher, made a video on how to create one. I had to cut out pieces of cardboard and glue them, it took about an hour for it to set. Then I taped some of the parts. Then, I made another beam but it was my own design, it took a shorter amount of time than the other one. I used the exact same materials: cardboard, tape, scissors, and tacky glue.

Then I tested both of them. I set up two chairs that had space between them, I put about seven books on each. I then put my beam on top of the books, less than an inch of the beam on each chair. I put a bag on the beam and put in cans one by one, I recorded this. Mr Calvert’s design worked perfectly, the beam didn’t even make a dent.

My design was not strong enough. When I was putting in my second can, it began to bend in the middle, very close to snapping in half. Then, I put in the third (and final) can and it fell. The beam fell to the floor along with the books I put on each chair.

Overall, this was really fun! I was a bit disappointed that my design was not strong enough for the cans. However, I was glad that one of the beams worked.

The first week of this course was really fun, we’ve had two actual classes this week. On Tuesday, we did some getting to know the class and learning about what we do in Technology. On Friday, we made bags with a lot of fun equipment, we did this in school. We took turns, when someone else was making their bags at the station we were watching a movie about machines. The bags are made up of electrical things, like wires and pliers. We also had some basic equipment too, such as scissors, rulers, and things like that.

I am really looking forward to making things with these! I want to make some sort of machine because I think that there would be all the equipment for it. I want to make it because we always use machines and it would be fun to make one instead!

In my project, I gave some information about presidents and asked a couple questions. I mainly talked about important presidents, like the ones that have done a lot to help the country. My project is related to the subject social studies or world history, earlier in the year, we were learning about this, around the time of the election. I liked this project about scientific notation (in maths) but I don’t know who published it. I really liked this because it clearly explained it all and nothing was too complicated to understand.