In the past the week we have been coming up with a main inquiry question for our topic. I had lots of trouble with coming up with a question and even more trouble with sub-questions. My inquiry question is; How is perfume made, why is it so expensive and where did perfume come from? It was hard because my topic is not the easiest to research or figure out how to turn it into a question. My main interests are smells and chemicals so bit by bit we narrowed down to a question. Most of my sub questions answer my main question but I think some go a little too broad.
For my sub questions I didn’t really have questions related to my topic but I tweaked them a little and then eventually they fit perfectly. I am pleased with my sub questions but I definitely need work with my main question. I think my question needs to go deeper.
Here are my Sub-Questions:
What chemicals and flowers are used most often and why?
How and why has perfume become more expensive over time?
How do the companies that manufacture perfume become so wealthy?
What is the process to making perfume?
How do different perfume brands compare in price?
What makes one more expensive than the other?
What prices are most customers willing to pay for perfumes and different brands?
In 1st grade is when I first learned about capstone I was so excited to see everyones project. I had started to think about my project and wanting to go all out on it. As years passed I became more eager to do the project. When I hit 5th grade I couldn’t wait to start so I waited for about 7 months. Then our teacher started introducing capstone to us and I got a little freaked out and started thinking to myself what if I didn’t have a topic, what is my presentation is horrible, what if I get a bad grade. I had all these worries and I didn’t know what I was going to do for my topic. I started thinking about what I wanted to do the first idea that popped into my mind was greek mythology. Then I started thinking about the company Tesla and how their future cars would effect our environment. Even though I already had a main inquiry question I realized that I wasn’t interested in the topic.
I was struggling with picking a topic so I asked my parents to help brainstorm some ideas that fit me. We went through hundreds of topics and I’m not joking it was literally hundreds of topics. I kept saying no to all of the topics because I was very picky about my topic. We still hadn’t figured out a topic and the due date for it was tomorrow so I was freaking out and I got really mad. My dad had mentioned that night that I liked smells and making concoctions. My mom came up with the idea the next morning that I should do my capstone on PERFUME. I loved that idea and was thrilled because I knew as soon as i walked through the classroom doorway my teacher would ask me what my topic was. Today I came up with my backup idea. I would research polymers.
I am so excited about capstone and can’t wait to get started.
In my opinion I think physical and mental disabilities matter the most. I think it matters the most kids who have these disabilities didn’t mean to be this way and can’t fix their problem. They are teased and picked on because of their appearance or their mental weaknesses. Some kids can’t talk, imagine what they have to say. Some kids can’t see, imagine all the wonderful sights they could see. Some kids can’t hear, think about what it would be like if you couldn’t hear. It is important because out of 1.9 billion kids why did it have to be them, why do some people have to live with this it shouldn’t happen to anybody, they didn’t ask for this. Kids are also treated differently. They’re still human.
I think that the fact that we judge people on how they look is outrageous. I can’t believe people are judging people when they haven’t even met them. I think almost everyone has heard the phrase “Don’t judge a book by its cover”. I think it’s horrendous that the world works like that. Wouldn’t you agree? I think the kids who get bombarded with bullies everyday are champions because most of them don’t let it get under their skin.
In school today we watched the SpaceX Launch. The Rocket that Elon Musk launched was called the Falcon Heavy. Musk is the founder, and CEO of the company Tesla. He is and engineer, investor, and an inventor. Musk was planning on sending a rocket into space with a car he invented inside the rocket, the car he sent into space was a Cherry Red Tesla Roadster. The boosters of the rocket were supposed to come back down and land on a pad. Two of the boosters made it and the third one ended up in the ocean, so two of them could get cleaned up have some parts replaced and it is as new so it can be used for the next rocket. Falcon Heavy is supposed to get alternated and could possibly take passengers all over the world wherever they want to go in less than an hour.
The SpaceX Launch was historic because it was the first rocket to use recycled boosters and have them land and they can be used again. I had already watched a video on Falcon Heavy with my dad, he told me that Elon Musk had designed the rocket, I was so surprised but I had already known that Elon Musk would have that sort of that technology. I thought that it was amazing and very advanced. The one thing that I want to know is if they are going to send another rocket into space and if people are going to be allowed to go into the rocket to take a trip in outer space!
When we got our success video I was so excited, but I wasn’t there when it happened. It took 16 attempts to get a final success. I was so happy and so relived when it worked because it wasn’t the most sophisticated machine and it wasn’t the most accurate. I was very relived because I wasn’t sure if it was going to work because sizing and weight were crucial.
I learned how to work in a group and cooperate with group members because in a group you have to be able to listen and share ideas. I also learned how to solve problems. When steps in our machine didn’t work we had to use materials around us improvise and use what we know to fix it.
I am very happy that we have a success video. We were hoping for more than the 10 steps that we had, but we had limited space as the machine was touching the floor on its last step.
When we were testing our machine, I wasn’t feeling confident that it was going to work. Some of the the parts that failed included keeping the tunnel in place as it kept falling so we added stronger tape to keep it in place; the marble kept going off the side of its path as there was an indent in the chair that we rested it on, so we had to get a heavier and bigger marble to knock the dominos down.
We learned that you need to have the right amount of weight to keep things going. We also learned we need to have lots of force for a chain reaction to work. At the end of the machine we had to make the tunnel higher so it would go into the cage because the cage is elevated.
I think we did a really good job with the Rube Goldberg project. One part that worked great is when a marble bounced off the drum and onto the blocks. I thought this part wouldn’t work because I thought it wouldn’t bounce and that the marble was too heavy and would break the flimsy little drum. It turned out the drum was pretty strong and the marble easily bounced onto the blocks. Setting up the machine again wasn’t hard because it was only dominos, everything else was taped or stuck in place.
I am very excited that our Rube Goldberg machine was successful! We might add more steps to improve our grade. What we had in our sketch is completely different then what we have actually built.
This is part of our rube Goldberg:
When we started building the machine, it worked. But when we added more steps, it became more complicated. We purposely started high off the ground so gravity can do it’s job. But towards the end our machine is close to the ground so space is limited to add new steps. We had to shave the carrot into a ball so that it rolls into a small cup that goes into the Guinea Pig’s cage. Today I went to Emily’s house to work on the machine and take multiple videos.
My favorite Rube Goldberg video is:
We learned that you need lots of momentum for our machine to actually work. I didn’t think we would get a success video in time but we managed to get it!
We started building our project and we got up to step six we tested it out and it worked but now we have to continue with machine. Setting up the dominos was very frustrating and as well as getting the right sized marble for our machine so that is can slide through our tunnels. At the start, our machine was very easy because it was just ramps and a roller coaster. Our machine is a little different compared to our plan. We also need to come up with different ideas for steps as we repeated many steps. We have tunnels, ramps, and dominos. I learned that you need a lot of momentum to keep the marble rolling. We are going to have to bend the path of the machine around the room. Our machine has multiple marbles to keep it going. We had to make a domino hold a marble so when it gets knocked over the marble will continue on the track.
We made our plan and now we have to build the contraption and hope it will work. It will probably take at least 20 attempts to finally get the carrot into the hole. For our plan, we are going to use tunnels, ramps, cardboard, and marbles etc. We had an easy time gathering materials because all of us have lots of ramps, springs, tunnels, cardboard etc. Emily has a marble roller coaster and we are going to use that to start our Rube Goldberg. We have ten steps on our plan paper but as soon as we get it going we will add more steps. We are going to have to skin the carrot a little bit to get it to fit trough the cage bars. Our Rube Goldberg will have Jenga pieces knock over a ball into the next step, but we are not close to being finished.
We recently started our Rube Goldberg Project which involves building simple machines that do very easy tasks like opening a book or turning on a light switch. You can choose to work alone or work in a group, with maximum 4 members in a group. My group is Emily, Naomi, and Carlie. The simple task we chose was sliding a carrot down a ramp and into Emily’s guinea pig cage. We came up with that idea while we were playing with Emily’s pets. Our teacher required us to have to have at least 8 steps. We have 6 right now but we are planing to have 15 steps. We are also supposed to take a video and share the accomplishment with our class. We also have to blog about the process along the way.
