Designing a Safer Helmet

Name: Megan Terlau Contact Info: [email protected] Date:17-Jul-15

Lesson Title: Helmets save lives Unit #: Lesson #: Activity #: Worksheet: e Activity Title: Challenge activity template 2 2 4 Worksheet Title: Process step by step

1 Designing a Safer Helmet Helmets save lives every day, but there are still injuries happening with the helmets on! Athletes and Scientists both need your help! You will be designing a safer helmet for an athlete to “wear” to stay safe during their sport. This will be a small scale pretend helmet that could be recreated by a company at a larger scale to fit a human head for an athlete to use! You will design and test, then attempt to “sell” your product to a sports team, or helmet company. You will have great ideas but remember what your rules and limits are:  Given materials are limited but you may ask about bringing other materials in

 Your helmet must fit around the sample cantaloupe in the classroom

 Your helmet but protect the melon from any breaking, cracking or shattering

 Your goal is to reduce the amount of force applied to the melon

 Your helmet may not be attached to the melon in any way, but must have a mechanism for holding the helmet on (think about how a football player takes a helmet off and on but has a chin strap to ensure it stays on)

The challenge STEP BY STEP:

Fill out each step of the process as you work through the Engineering Design Process.

1. Identify and Define:

 What is the challenge?

 What are your constraints? 2 2. Gather Information:

 What key pieces of information are you going to consider from your guided research?

3. Identify Alternatives:

 Sketch a minimum of TWO designs for your structure. Use another sheet of paper if needed.

4. Select Solutions:

 Which sketch are you going to build and why did you select this design?

5. Implement Solutions:

 What materials are you using to implement your design?

 Record as you build. You must record at least 3-5 details as you go.

Consider things such as: How is the group working together? Are you changing anything as you go and if so why? What is a struggle that you are having? What is a success that you are having? What is something that surprised you? 1.

3 Prior to evaluating you need to know the mass of your helmet. Use the scale in the classroom to measure the mass of your helmet.

Fixed acceleration of a falling object=9.8m/s

Calculate force on your helmet:

F=______x 9.8 m/s

F=______

6. Evaluate Solution: As a class we will go to the top of the football stadium and drop our helmets containing a melon.

** You have a single sheet that you will take to the football stadium to record results

7. REFINE: Change your design. Maybe you need to go back to your guided research, or maybe you need to try that other sketch from the beginning, or maybe you can just add another material to the outside for cushion. YOU DECIDE! Remember if you add mass, you are adding force (which isn’t good)

 What do you need to change to make it better?

 What ideas does your group have?

 Make a new sketch, and change what you need to change!

Redesign sketch:

4 8. Evaluate Solution: We will retest our new designs using the same procedure as trial 1.

Prior to evaluating you need to know the mass of your helmet. Use the balance in the classroom to measure the mass of your helmet.

Fixed acceleration of a falling object=9.8m/s

Calculate force on your helmet:

F=______x 9.8 m/s

F=______