PROJECT TITLE

Let’s go for a ride!

The physics of roller-coasters

 

 

INTRODUCTION

This is a scientific project aiming at explaining the abstract concepts of motion and energy, as studied in the physics lessons at school, through the use of these concepts in real life situations, as encountered in amusement parks. The project aims at stimulating a wider view of the scientific topics.

The students from different nationalities will form mixed-groups that will search for information on a specific attraction in an amusement park and describe the physics involved in it. In doing so, the students will both broaden their understanding and improve their social competence and language skills.

To make the experience more realistic, the students will build simple models of the attractions and make visits to an amusement park or to a manufacturer of attraction-wheels.

 

INVOLVED SUBJECTS

Physics, English, Information Technology

 

OBJECTIVES

• To stimulate the students to communicate in a foreign language.
• To enhance social competences and promote cooperative learning.
• To motivate the students to explore the world in a scientific way.
• To open up the minds of the students by letting them realize that what they study at school is important for other people too.
• To increase the motivation and satisfaction in learning at school.
• To help students to understand the role of science and technology in their lives.
• To improve the student and teacher ability to utilize information technology tools.

 

WORKING PROCEDURE

• Project opening with the creation of a logo (in a contest).
• Student presentations of themselves, their school, their town and their physics course.
• Brain storm: the students propose the attractions, the physics to study in the attraction, and how to build a model.
• Group formation and assignment of work tasks.
• The students work on their attraction. They study energy, acceleration, forces, etc, by using real parameters from the attraction in a park close to them.
• The students (in national sub-groups) create a scale model of their attraction and perform measurements on their model (for example by video-analysis). The different sub-groups  confront their results with the sub-groups of the other country who made the similar attraction.
• The end result should be a common description of the attraction from a physical point of view (that could include comparisons between models and real attractions), to be presented on the twinspace.
• The students evaluate their respective works by a voting procedure to select the 3 best works.
• The project is concluded by a visit to the amusement park “Mirabilandia”, for the Italian students, and to the wheel manufacturing company “Vulkoprin” for the Belgian students. In these visits the students can compare their theoretical findings with the real life experiences. 

The visits will be documented by creating posters to share with the other groups.

 

EXPECTED RESULTS

• The students will acquire a deeper understanding of basics physics concepts such as acceleration, force, rotational motion, energy and different energy forms.
• The involved physical concepts will become less theoretical and abstract and more linked to everyday experiences.
• Thanks to their participation in the learning activities, the students will improve their communication and linguistic skills.
• Thanks to the group work and the exchange with the twin school, the students will improve their social skills and emotional maturity.
• A variety of pedagogical methods and information technology tools will be used, so students and teachers will develop new competences.
• In addition to making the twinspace public, the results of the project will be disseminated in the participating schools (e.g. in the school web-site, student journals, teacher meetings, etc.).

 

ACTIVITIES AND TIME SCHEDULE

WARM-UP ACTIVITIES (January)

1. Each class is divided in preliminary groups by  their teacher. Each group has to propose a logo. By a voting procedure (using the tool “Tricider”) the best logo is selected for the project.
2. The preliminary groups prepare short presentations of themselves, their school, their town and their physics course. The personal presentations are posted on a padlet.
3. Brain storm: the students propose the attractions, the physics to study in the attraction, and how to build a model. The proposals are posted on a padlet.
4. The students express their preferences on which attraction they want to work on. Based on the preferences, the teachers form the mixed groups.
5. The students exchange their email, facebook-account, whatsapp, etc.

MAIN ACTIVITY (February-April)

6. Work on the attractions studying energy, acceleration, rotation, forces, etc, by using real parameters found on the web for attractions in amusement parks. Period: February-March
7. The students (in national sub-groups) create a scale model of their attraction and perform measurements on their model (for example by video-analysis). Period: March-April
8. The different sub-groups confront their results. The end result should be a common description of the attraction from a physical point of view (that could include comparisons between models and real attractions), to be presented on the twinspace. Period: end of April.

CONCLUDING ACTIVITY (May)

1. The students evaluate their respective works by a voting procedure to select the 3 best works. Period: May.
10. The Italian students visit to the amusement park “Mirabilandia”  (in Ravenna) and  the Belgian students visit the wheel manufacturing company “Vulkoprin”  (in Tielt).

The visits will be documented by creating posters (using the tool “Canva”) to share with the other groups. Period: May.