Enduring understanding

• Energy plays an important role in manufacturing design.

 

Essential Questions

• What do all traditional roller coasters have in common as their energy source?

• How is a roller coaster able to travel up hills and do loops without an engine?

• What forces create a roller coaster ride?

• How do you use the engineering process to design and create a roller coaster that fits within budget and design specifications?

• How do engineers use science to create a fun and safe rollercoaster for the public?

 

 

Standards Alignment

NGSS:

• MS-PS2-2. Plan an investigation to provide evidence that the change in an object’s motion depends on the sum of the forces on the object and the mass of the object.

• MS-PS3-1. Construct and interpret graphical displays of data to describe the relationships of kinetic energy to the mass of an object and to the speed of an object.

• MS-PS3-2. Develop a model to describe that when the arrangement of objects interacting at a distance changes, different amounts of potential energy are stored in the system.

• MS-ETS1-1. Define the criteria and constraints of a design problem with sufficient precision to ensure a successful solution, taking into account relevant scientific principles and potential impacts on people and the natural environment that may limit possible solutions.

• MS-ETS1-2. Evaluate competing design solutions using a systematic process to determine how well they meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.

• MS-ETS1-3. Analyze data from tests to determine similarities and differences among several design solutions to identify the best characteristics of each that can be combined into a new solution to better meet the criteria for success.

• MS-ETS1-4. Develop a model to generate data for iterative testing and modification of a proposed object, tool, or process such that an optimal design can be achieved.

 

CCSS:

ELA/Literacy

• RST.6-8.1 Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of science and technical texts, attending to the precise details of explanations or descriptions. 

• RST.6-8.3 Follow precisely a multistep procedure when carrying out experiments, taking measurements, or performing technical tasks. 

• WHST.6-8.1 Write arguments focused on discipline-specific content. 

• WHST.6-8.7 Conduct short research projects to answer a question (including a self-generated question), drawing on several sources and generating additional related, focused questions that allow for multiple avenues of exploration. 

 

Mathematics 

• MP.2 Reason abstractly and quantitatively. 

• 6.NS.C.5 Understand that positive and negative numbers are used together to describe quantities having opposite directions or values; use positive and negative numbers to represent quantities in real-world contexts, explaining the meaning of 0 in each situation.

• 6.EE.A.2 Write, read, and evaluate expressions in which letters stand for numbers.

• 7.EE.B.3 Solve multi-step real-life and mathematical problems posed with positive and negative rational numbers in any form, using tools strategically. Apply properties of operations to calculate with numbers in any form; convert between forms as appropriate; and assess the reasonableness of answers using mental computation and estimation strategies. 

• 7.EE.B.4 Use variables to represent quantities in a real-world or mathematical problem, and construct simple equations and inequalities to solve problems by reasoning about the quantities.