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Feb 15

Rube Goldberg #3

by mshetty26

Rube Goldberg Blog Post #3

The Building Process

I have started building based on some of the ideas that I have so far. I have five steps right now and I have some additional ideas for the next three steps. As I mentioned before, I am planning to do an eight step design.

 

For the first five steps, I begin with a marble run, where the marble moves through an assigned path. The marble then rolls across the bridge, colliding with a car. The car will then hit a ball, making the ball go down the ramp. After that the ball is going to land in a cone attached to a balance. I had to think hard about how to capture the ball, and after a few iterations came up with an idea of building a cone. That worked well!

 

The ideas for the other three steps are as follows: The ball causes the side with the cone to do down while the other side goes up (like a see-saw), this causes the spinner to spin. When the spinner spins, it knocks a ball down a ramp. At the end of the ramp, I want to place some dominos that the ball can knock over. I was thinking that maybe the last domino would be attached to a yo-yo string which knocks over another set of dominos. That last part took a lot of iterations to get working, and I was so happy when it did! I had a few fails with my machine but I learnt from them and fixed them. Some worked and some didn’t. It’s not how many times you fail, but whether you overcome failure and succeed in the end!

5th grade Science

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Feb 15

Rube Goldberg #2

by mshetty26

Rube Goldberg  #2

The Designing

I decided that my Rube Goldberg machine would do a simple task of “Recycling the cup”. I was very excited to share this plan with my family. My little brother helped me find all the materials I needed to build. We collected a ton of paper towel tubes and toilet paper tubes. I used the tubes as ramps. I also found a toy bridge, a toy parking garage, a marble run, a k’nex building set, and some balls.

 

I started sketching my ideas on paper. The process of sketching was very interesting and I learnt a lot. Some of my initial drawings which looked perfect on paper and I thought I had nailed it on the first attempt, actually did not work when I built it. It was a good learning experience for me: Think of a design, sketch it, gather materials, build it, test it, fail/ pass. If you fail, then go back to the drawing board to make iterations or make a new design!

 

I have five steps currently and some ideas for the next three steps. In all, I plan to do an eight step design. This is hard work but also a lot of fun!

 

5th grade Science

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Feb 14

Rube Goldberg #1

by mshetty26

Rube Goldberg Blog Post #1

The Decisions

From the moment Mrs. Edwards explained that we are going to make a Rube Goldberg machine, I was very excited! A part that really stood out to me was that the video of the machine was going to be posted on YouTube! I was looking forward to building my contraption.

Before I began, I had to understand what exactly was a Rube Goldberg machine. Do you know what a Rube Goldberg machine is? A Rube Goldberg machine is a machine that is intentionally designed to perform a simple task in an indirect and over-complicated fashion. The expression is named after the American cartoonist, Rube Goldberg, whose cartoons often depicted such machines.

After we were assigned the project, we first had to decide if we were working independently or in a group. Initially I was leaning towards working in a group, but after thinking about it and trying to figure out what the best option was for me to make my experience the most enjoyable and educational, I decided that I would work independently. I understood that working alone would be very hard as I would have to do everything and I was okay with that. The biggest advantage of working alone for me was, that it would give me freedom to choose time according to my convenience to work on the project and i wouldn’t need to compromise on my ideas/ design. It was easy to decide where I would be doing my project. That would be the basement in my home!

I decided to start building and sketching simultaneously as that would help me with adjusting the design to make it a working model. When I started building I used materials that I already had at my house, which was mostly toys and paper towel tubes. Building the machine also helped me with sketching the design which is due on 2/12.

 

 

5th grade Science

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Feb 1

THE KINDNESS CHALLENGE

by mshetty26

It is important to be kind. That is what I think, and what everybody should think.This week in school we did something called The Kindness Challenge. We do it every year. I think this challenge is fun and very important as it makes us very conscious of our actions. Action like helping a younger child or putting a nice note in a friends backpack or saying something encouraging to a friend. It can also start with something really simple like saying “please” and “thank you”. Read on to find out what I did!

 

So what I did was, “embrace your family with a big hug”, “help your PE teacher with the equipment”, “smile at 25 people”, “slip a nice note in a friends backpack”, “help someone if they fall down”, “hold the door for someone”, “be kind to yourself and eat a healthy snack” and “be on time for school”. It was fun trying to do all the kind things. I felt happy to make others happy.

 

If everyone would do just five kind deeds every day, the world would be a better place. We always expect others to be kind to us, but we should also check if we are being kind to others. If everyone just focuses on their actions this world would be a much kinder place.

5th grade Social Studies

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