Metaphor Machines

Hello and welcome back to my blog. Today’s post is about our new scimatics project, metaphor machines. This project had to do with Rude Goldberg machines and electrical circuits. In this project I was in a group with Mickey, Cooper, and Landon. To construct this machine, we made a series of blueprints, individually, and as a group. 

Here was my project start mindmap:

 

 

 

 

 

To learn about scale drawings and circuits, we did workbooks again and more Khan Academy quizzes. These all helped us create our scale blueprints:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The blueprints include a diagram for the electrical circuit which we had to include which had voltage, current and resistance. Also labelled, is the materials and how big or small everything was according to the scale. 

Comptencies:

Questioning and predicting: Demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest

I think this competency could have been improved upon in this project in various ways. I think that I could have done better in this project if I had used this competency while thinking about and working on this project. At nature I don’t find myself particularly driven in scientific or mathematic projects which makes it difficult for me to have a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic.   

Reasoning and Analyzing: estimate reasonably 

I believe I used this competency well in creating our blueprints. I was able to predict how our rude Goldberg machine would go and if it would work. (Which it did!)

Planning and conducting: Select and use appropriate equipment, including digital technologies to systemically and accurately collect and record data

I used this competency well in Milestone 3 which was a Khan Academy quiz. I was able to get a full understanding of scale drawings using digital technology and do well on the quiz and practice worksheets.

A part of this project I particularly enjoyed was painting, planning, and constructing our machine. I think this project could have gone better for me, I’m not super proud of how I did because I was sick for a while and got behind in my work which created a black hole of overdue work and assignments for me which was super overwhelming. I’m pleased with our final machine however. 

Answering the driving question:

For this project, there were two driving questions.

1. How can we represent the scientific method?

We were able to represent the scientific method in the stages of our machine which was explained in the video:

2. What factors affect the function and efficiency of electric circuits?

The factors that affect the function and efficiency of electric circuits are voltage, current, and resistance.

Thank you for reading and take a look at my project end mindmap!

 

 

 

Sincerely,

Me