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'Tis spring and often I turned my students attentions to flight. I've been slowly gleaning resources from the Learning Center on flight (and I have omitted kites, but not on purpose) and I am hoping that by sharing the titles in this collection, one of you may be inclined to share what you do with flight with your students.
This is an open-ended thread....let's see what flies:}
~patty
Flight- gliders, planes, balloons Collection
(8 items)
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The foam plate gliders are a really cheap and simple way to start with model airplanes. I have been working on expanding the type of foam plate glider that can be built. One I built is a canard (tail first), the Wright Brothers designed planes that were canards.
This is pretty cool, from The Children's Museum of Indianapolis website.
Foam Glider Simulator
Bill Kuhl
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Hi Bill,
Thanks for checking in and sharing this glider site. I am aware of your many contributions to flight on other threads and welcome your input on this one. This is a great way to build momentum:}
~patty
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Speaking of kites, which is a great spring activity where I live because it is normally windy, I created a video of kite flying and building. It shows the basics of adjusting the kite and how to build a diamond kite.
Building & Flying Kites..
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Thanks everyone for the great resources we all know that physical science has so many topics to cover. I always wanted to do something with balloons and kites. You guys have given me so many ideas to try out with my students.
Thanks again, Helen
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Hi Helen,
Doing projects with kites and balloons is a great way to evaluate student understanding, too. Thanks for chiming in and we look forward to hearing what your plans are.
Continue to give us a shout when you can.
~patty
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I like to introduce flight with simple "bunny ear" paper helicopters. The students are so sure they will not fly, their amazement at the height and distance they can achieve is fun to watch. With assistance from a slight breeze, the 'copters spinning flight path will have the students running the length of the playground to catch up with them.
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My students built Bill’s Hammer Down Gliders with huge success last fall. The plans are well written out and the photos help guide them along the way. What’s really nice is the plans allow the students to have some leeway in their creativity as well. The materials were easy to obtain and not overly expensive. The link to Bill’s instructions is http://www.scienceguy.org/Articles/HammerDownCatapultGlider.aspx
For those of you that have never visited his website, you are in for a treat. His home page is http://www.scienceguy.org/Home.aspx
So many great ideas, so little time.
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Aloha,
I am currently in the middle of a unit on Forces of Flight with my 6th grade students. If you are in Hawaii I highly recommend that you look into the Pacific Aviation Museum at Pearl Harbor. There is a group of volunteers called the "Barnstormers" that visit 6th grade classrooms on Oahu (not sure about the outer islands...). They bring in balsa wood gliders prior to their visit to allow the students to explore the movable parts on a plane and learn about the 4 forces that affect flight: weight, lift, thrust and drag. When they visit, they bring a very large wind tunnel to show how the angle of the wing affects lift and a huge model plane that students can control - while sitting in a makeshift cockpit. They also have teachers that explore various experiments with the students that relate to Newton's 3rd law and Bernoulli's Principle. This is the 2nd year I've had them in my classroom, and the students love the experience!
I am currently trying to think of good popular movies that I could incorporate into this unit to aid students understanding of the forces of flight. Does anyone have any ideas of good movie clips that could be incorporated?
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Here is an even simpler foam glider. Takes three 9" foam plates, a straw, clay, and masking tape. The wing has a slight airfoil curve to it made by rolling a dowel underneath it. I find masking tape seems to stick better than clear tape. With the straw over the wing dihedral joint it really makes for a solid joint. I was even able to discuss launch the glider, hold a wing tip with your fingers, spin around and release. For good flights it is important to get enough clay in the nose for a good glide without getting too much weight which cause a dive.
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Hi Nicole,
Here is an interesting video from utube on the fundamental forces on flight - from the Microsoft flight simulator
http://www.njaudubon.org/SectionCenters/SectionNCCM/Introduction.aspx
and here is a short instructional video from NASA SCI files ( wind tunnels, too)
http://archive.org/details/NasaSciFiles-TheFourForcesOfFlight
You may want to explore if you could incorporate these into your wonderful unit with the folks in Hawaii and with the wind tunnel. How cool!
~patty
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