We created two windmill designs. The blades would turn in the wind, which would turn the shaft of a motor hidden inside the windmill, subsequently generating electricity. (Click on the pictures to see tutorials for each design).

For anybody who may be picking up this project in the future, I suggest you implement all of the changes that are written in the 'What We Would do Differently' section. After that, you should try connecting a micro:bit to the windmill and then connect it to a spreadsheet to get more data such as live power generation, recorded trials, trial history, graphs, etc. The instructions for this can be found if you click on the picture of the first design of our windmill.

We're hearing about climate change and how the greenhouse gases produced by the fossil fuels that we burn are contributing to it. Wind power, this sustainable source of energy, could not only help colonies on Mars, but could also help with the issue of global warming on Earth. The next generation, young innovators and scientists, us, will be the ones to solve this problem. If you new students pick up where we left off, perhaps you could get a spark of innovation and design a windmill that's better than anything we've ever seen before to help combat climate change. Perhaps if we ever do settle on Mars permanently, your innovations could be game-changing in regards to energy production on the red planet.

If any of you new students decide to take this project on, we'd really like to see you create a windmill that not only powers one LED but many, as much as a bundle of Christmas lights. Perhaps even a few LED lights meant for lighting up rooms. The windmill would have to be big with a very, very large motor and expertly designed blades. 

In the end, we couldn't continue because we ran out of time. We couldn't expand this project, achieve our goal, and make it bigger and better. But now, with our tips of what not to do and added guidance, you new students can make this project evolve. You can make it more than we ever imagined it to be. Instead of powering one LED, you could power many, or bigger lights. All you need is patience in the face of adversity, perseverance when something goes awry, the endurance to bear the sting of failure, and the resolve to see it all through to the end. There's no doubt that as long as you have this mindset, this project will be a piece of cake.

• Each member of the group should reflect on what they learned.  You may have learned some neat stuff about science, but you also learned some other great skills like time management, goal setting, collaboration, and problem solving. 

What I learned about while working on this project is, problem solving because we had a lot of failures while trying to make the windmill spin so we came up with different ideas to solve the issue. Time management wasn't a big part because we had a really long time to work on it and we managed to finish before the finish date. Collaboration is the biggest one because we shared work, had others join in and help instead of sitting there. Overall it was neat to see what we could do to make electricity and many ideas of others, I really enjoyed doing this. (YAKOUB)

One of the biggest things that I learned was that, when setting deadlines for yourself, if you think that you'll be done a certain task that involves hands-on work which can only be done during class, give yourself more time than you think you need. You'll soon realize that whatever work that had needed to be done takes a long longer than originally imagined. Something neat that I learned was that some voltmeters are more precise than others, meaning that if you're not picking up any voltage, it might be because you're generating so little electricity that the voltmeter can't pick it up and a more precise one is needed. Another thing is that no matter how much you've tried but failed, how hard you've worked to no avail, you must not simply say, "It's too much," and give up because if you stick to it and keep trying your best without rest, in the end, you'll fix whatever was wrong and you'll succeed. None of us gave up, but we persevered till the end and managed to fix the first design of our windmill. If we had given up in the middle of it because the hot glue was finicky or the pulleys were too big, then we never would have been able to get to where we got to by the end. Finally, I learned how to better collaborate with many group members and make sure that everybody got included. (Haider) 

     I learned how to work together as a group and solve problems together. Together we were able to brainstorm and figure out the best way to produce energy on mars as well as how to build it. We had multiple issues come up when building the windmill and we were able to collect our ideas together and come up with solutions for them.  (Zack)

I learned how to collaborate with other students in my learning environment to create solutions and solve problems. We had a variety of issues approaching the function of the windmill, our pulleys wouldn't stay still when we put the windmill in front of direct wind, and the rubber band kept popping off. After readjusting things so many times, we figured out the right size bands, right angles for the pulleys, and the right rotors to produce a decent voltage. This wouldn't have been possible without the help of my classmates' help. (lilas)