Our challenge was that we were engineers, who had design a spaceship that could take us to Saturn either as tourists or as scientists. First they learned some basic facts about Saturn so that they would know what we needed to consider as we created our ships. Then they sketched their designs in groups so they would have a map of what needed to be built. This was the time to make sure they had considered all the problems- How would they keep their astronauts from freezing since Saturn is almost -300 degrees? How and where would they land? How would they gather things to take home and study? How would they propel their spaceship all the way to Saturn?
Then it was time to build! They came up with some pretty creative solutions using the different materials provided, and did a great job presenting them to their classmates. I was very impressed! Here are a couple examples:
