STEM Specialist Activity | STEM Career Connection: Materials Manager, Composite Engineering
STEM professionals have created innovations that have helped our favorite athletes excel and stay safe. Now it’s your students’ turn to design a solution to the challenges their favorite athletes are facing.
Materials:
Pencils
Paper
Materials for poster boards (scissors, construction paper, glue)
Student Technology - Ipad, Chromebook, etc.
Predict:
What types of inventions have been made specifically for football players?
Plan:
What challenges do football players face that we might not already have a solution for? What sports do you play that could use an invention to help players perform better?
Play:
As a class, read through the “Dennis Ryan Vikings Bio” and “Dennis Ryan - Helmet Visor” articles in the Resources section.
Be sure that you point out that Dennis Ryan created the Helmet Visor for a player that needed a specialized piece of equipment.
As a class, brainstorm a list of different sports that they play.
Using that list, brainstorm inventions that could be created to help an athlete address a challenge.
Have students draw out their inventions and provide a brief description of the purpose.
Students can create their own or use ideas generated from the list.
If students have experience with TinkerCAD, have them build their invention with the 3D modeling software.
If students have no experience with TinkerCAD, have them complete the six “Get Started” step- by-step tutorials. Students could draw their inventions or create them with play dough.
Have students create a poster board explaining their new invention, its purpose, the materials they used, and other relevant information. Be creative!
Have students complete a gallery walk, looking at their peers’ inventions.
Ponder:
What similarities and differences did you notice between inventions with similar purposes?
What invention was your favorite? Why?
After seeing some of your peers’ inventions, what could you do to further improve your own?
Extension:
If time allows, have students provide constructive feedback during the gallery walk. Students can make an improved version of their invention based on that feedback.
Read “Dennis Ryan Equipment Manager of the Year” in the Resource section. Have students vote on the class “equipment manager of the year” based on which invention would keep athletes the safest.