Students investigate what causes them to become sick during the school year. They use the engineering design process to test the classroom lab spaces for bacteria. After their tests, they develop ideas to control the spread of germs within the classroom.

Create popsicles using the engineering design process! In this activity, students work to solve the problems of a local popsicle shop while learning how scientific and engineering concepts play a part in behind-the-scenes design.

Students perform research and design prosthetic prototypes for an animal to use for its survival. They research a set of pre-chosen animals and their habitats. They then create habitats for their animals to live and model 3D prosthetics for the animals to use with modeling clay.

Students employ the engineering design process to create a device that uses water-absorbing crystals for use during a flood or storm surge. They use (or build) a toy house, follow the engineering design process to build their device, and subject the house to tests that mimic a heavy flood or rising ...

Given scrap cardboard, paper towel tubes, scissors, and glue, how could a student invent their own backscratcher? Engage in the process of how real engineers design products to meet a desired function.

Design a customized table top supply organizer inspired by the natural home of a ladybug—or any other insect of a student's choosing—to hold all of their classroom supplies! By the end of this activity, students will understand the properties of biomimicry and the engineering design process.

Students use the engineering design process to design a bridge out of silkworm cocoons that can hold at least 50 grams. Students can use other materials to supplement the silk bridge, but have a $10 budget.

If you lived in the snowiest place in the world, you would need a specific type of roof on your house. But what kind of roof is best? Learn about the creative thinking and considerations engineers use to solve practical problems in designing structures to keep buildings secure and safe.

In this activity, students build a road out of Jell-O that is sturdy enough to drive a toy car across without sinking. Using the full engineering design process, students research and choose available ingredients that will support their car.

A unique activity for young learners that combines engineering and biology, students design an optimal environment for red wiggler worms in a compost bin.

In this maker challenge, students use the engineering design process to design a covering for a portable wheelchair ramp for their school. The design must be easy to use, and allows people to move up the ramp easily and go down slowly.

Students apply engineering skills to engineer the best slime! Beginning with a given recipe, students make slime, observe it, and then decide on what and how they want to improve it (for example, stickier, less sticky, etc.) Students then make their updated slime by implementing the changes they wan...

In this engineering design activity, students build models of natural sources of water. As they move through the design process, students differentiate between natural sources of water (such as rivers or lakes) and human-made sources of water, such as reservoirs or canals. Students learn how enginee...

In this multi-day activity, students explore environments, ecosystems, energy flow and organism interactions by creating a scale model biodome, following the steps of the engineering design process.

Athletes often wear protective gear to keep themselves safe in contact sports. In this spirit, students follow the steps of engineering design process as they design, build and test protective padding for an egg drop.

Whether on Earth or in space, life-threatening illnesses may occur if the water we drink is of poor quality. It’s up to your students to design and build a filtration system for the International Space Station so they can guarantee astronauts get the safe and clean water they need.

Your students have been hired to build a pop rocket, but on a tight budget. Engineering design usually has some constraints and you won’t always have access to the materials you think you might need. But through brainstorming and trial and error, a viable rocket launch is definitely possible!

In this activity, students use a variety of materials to design and create headphones that absorb sound. Students apply steps of the Engineering Design Process to identify a problem, develop possible solutions, select the most promising solution, create their prototypes, test and evaluate their prot...

Students learn about using renewable energy from the sun for heating and cooking as they build and compare the performance of four solar cooker designs. They explore the concepts of insulation, reflection, absorption, conduction and convection. Then, as time permits, they make and eat quick-cooking ...

Students pretend they are agricultural engineers during the colonial period and design a miniature plow that cuts through a "field" of soil. They are introduced to the engineering design process and learn of several famous historical figures who contributed to plow design.

Students learn about challenges of eating in the microgravity environment of space, includig the seven different forms of food that are available to astronauts. They follow the steps of the engineering design process, and then, acting as NASA engineering teams, they design and build their own protot...

When a person gets injured in the wilderness and needs medical attention, rescuers might use a device called a mountain rescue litter specifically designed for difficult evacuations. Design and build a small-sized prototype to save some (potatoes’) lives!

Build a model race car out of lifesaver candies, popsicle sticks, straws, and other fun materials! Have students learn about independent, dependent, and control variables, and find out who can make the fastest car given their new knowledge.

Students are introduced to brainstorming and the design process in problem solving as it relates to engineering. They perform an activity to develop and understand problem solving with an emphasis on learning from history.

Students learn about oil spills and their environmental and economic impact. They experience the steps of the engineering design process, starting by brainstorming ways to clean up oil spills, and then designing, building and re-designing oil booms to prevent the spread of oil on water. During a con...

Students use a table-top-sized tsunami generator to observe the formation and devastation of a tsunami. Students make villages of model houses and buildings to test how different material types are impacted by the huge waves.

Students observe a model waterwheel to investigate the transformations of energy involved in turning the blades of a hydro-turbine. They work as engineers to create model waterwheels while considering resources such as time and materials, in their designs. Students also discuss and explore the chara...

Create a rain garden students can take home! In this activity, students build a green infrastructure dedicated to housing native species and learn about the importance of low-impact development technology.

Students design, build and test looping model roller coasters using foam pipe insulation tubing. They learn about potential and kinetic energy as they test and evaluate designs, addressing the task as if they are engineers. Winning designs have the lowest cost and best aesthetics. Three student work...

Students learn more about assistive devices, specifically biomedical engineering applied to computer engineering concepts, with an engineering challenge to create an automatic floor cleaner computer program. Following the steps of the design process, they design computer programs and test them by pr...

Students use a small quantity of modeling clay to make boats that float in a tub of water. The object is to build boats that hold as much weight as possible without sinking. In the process of designing and testing their prototype creations, students discover some of the basic principles of boat desi...

In this activity, students undertake a similar engineering challenge as they design and build a filter to remove pepper from an air stream without blocking more than 50% of the air.

Following the steps of the engineering design process and acting as biomedical engineers, student teams use everyday materials to design and develop devices and approaches to unclog blood vessels. Through this open-ended design project, they learn about the circulatory system, biomedical engineering...

Student groups are given a set of materials: cardboard, insulating materials, aluminum foil and Plexiglas, and challenged to build solar ovens. The ovens must collect and store as much of the sun's energy as possible. Students experiment with heat transfer through conduction by how well the oven is ...

Students explore how mass affects momentum in head-on collisions and experience the engineering design process as if they are engineers working on the next big safety feature for passenger cars. They design, create and redesign impact-resistant passenger vehicle compartments for small-size model car...

Students are given a biomedical engineering challenge, which they solve while following the steps of the engineering design process. In a design lab environment, student groups design, create and test prototype devices that help people using crutches carry things, such as books and school supplies.

Students learn the engineering design process by following the steps, from problem identification to designing a device and evaluating its efficacy and areas for improvement. Acting as biomedical engineers, students are asked to design a device to remove it.

Students further their understanding of the engineering design process while combining mechanical engineering and bioengineering to create an automated medical device.

Students design and build a mechanical arm that lifts and moves an empty 12-ounce soda can using hydraulics for power. Small design teams (1-2 students each) design and build a single axis for use in the completed mechanical arm.

Students further their understanding of the engineering design process (EDP) while being introduced to assistive technology devices and biomedical engineering. They are given a fictional client statement and are tasked to follow the steps of the EDP to design and build small-scale, off-road wheelcha...

Students get introduced to the real-world technical tool of a wind turbine propeller attachment. It’s a device that efficiently harvests wind energy, and in this activity they’ll build one of their own using a LEGO wind turbine, fan, and energy meter.

Students use their knowledge about how healthy heart valves function to design, construct and implant prototype replacement mitral valves for hypothetical patients' hearts. Building on what they learned in the associated lesson about artificial heart valves, combined with the testing and scoring of ...

In this culminating activity, student groups act as engineering design teams to derive equations to determine the stability of specific above-ground storage tank scenarios with given tank specifications and liquid contents. With their flotation analyses completed and the stability determined, studen...

Student teams design their own booms (bridges) and engage in a friendly competition with other teams to test their designs. Each team strives to design a boom that is light, can hold a certain amount of weight, and is affordable to build.

Students gain practice in Arduino fundamentals as they design their own small-sized prototype light sculptures to light up a hypothetical courtyard. They program Arduino microcontrollers to control the lighting behavior of at least three light-emitting diodes (LEDs) to create imaginative light displ...

How do solar panels capture energy from the sun? Have students build their own reflector and measure the solar energy output using only a photovoltaic panel, a multimeter, cardboard, and foil!

Student teams design and build shoe prototypes that convert between high heels and athletic shoes. They apply their knowledge about the mechanics of walking and running as well as shoe design (as learned in the associated lesson) to design a multifunctional shoe that is both fashionable and function...

Students are introduced to the biomechanical characteristics of helmets, and are challenged to incorporate them into designs for helmets used for various applications.

Build a small roller coaster prototype out of foam pipe wrap insulation and marbles, but apply calculus and physics in the design! This real-world engineering challenge applies practical mathematics to test small-sized models on a real track.

Student teams create laparoscopic surgical robots designed to reduce the invasiveness of diagnosing endometriosis and investigate how the disease forms and spreads. Using a synthetic abdominal cavity simulator, students test and iterate their remotely controlled, camera-toting prototype devices, whi...

Following the steps of the iterative engineering design process, student teams use what they learned in the previous lessons and activity in this unit to research and choose materials for their model heart valves and test those materials to compare their properties to known properties of real heart ...

In this service-learning engineering project, students follow the steps of the engineering design process to design an assistive eating device for a client. More specifically, they design a prototype device to help a young girl who has a medical condition that restricts the motion of her joints to e...

Students apply their understanding of light polarization and attenuation to design, fabricate, test and refine their own prototype sunglasses that better reduce glare and lower light intensity compared to available sunglasses, and better protect eyes from UVA and UVB radiation. They meet the project...

How might engineers keep people safe during a hurricane? Students use a hurricane tracking map to measure and graph how close the eye of a hurricane is from population centers, and then analyze MATLAB computer code generated by hurricane tracking data.

Student teams design, build and test small-sized gliders to maximize flight distance and an aerodynamic ratio, applying their knowledge of fluid dynamics to its role in flight. Students experience the entire engineering design process, from brainstorming to CAD (or by hand) drafting, including resea...

In this activity, student teams design, prototype and test piping systems to transport water from a storage tank to an existing Tippy Tap hand-washing station, thereby creating a more efficient hand-washing station. Through this example service-learning engineering project, students learn basic flui...