The students at Adams Elementary embarked on a thrilling journey of learning, innovation, and sustainability where they investigated the physics of fun in their recycled roller coaster project! Our Prehistoric Rollergator group researched, planned, designed, and built a roller coaster track with the task to get the marble through the entire track using enough kinetic and potential energy, and to conduct trials to measure friction and mass.  Students worked in pairs on specific tasks and brought all components together to form a completed roller coaster and informative presentation. Students had to think critically by problem solving and developing innovative solutions to meet their requirements for their coaster, they had to work collaboratively with a cohesive theme and bring individual tasks together, and students communicate their progress through the creation of a progression website, with their classmates, and with the lovely folks at H21! 

Students each made individual track designs that were combined into one main design. Using the Design Process - when in the building and testing stage- we determined we would need 2 separate tracks, so we created another straight coaster track as well. We also eliminated our launcher through the redesign process, as it was no longer necessary to collect our data.