Wind turbines

This was phase one of a larger lesson I hope to work on. Students were given basic materials that they could use to create a wind turbine. Next year I hope to get some money to buy little motors so they can actually create energy from their wind turbines to light up a little led or similar. I love projects that start with "this is sooooo easy" and quickly turn into "this is impossible, nothing works!" Something missing from these students (and countless others) is perseverance. The final designs that worked were not created by the academically best students, but they were created by students who tried, failed, revised, tried, failed, revised, and tried again. That willingness to continue to work and not just give up when it gets hard is difficult to teach so I was glad they were provided that space to fail and then keep working on their designs. Here are the designs that consistently spun and would not topple over when placed in front of the fan.