The Team X Project Blog Post #3

Welcome to my third blog post on the Team X Project, where I reflect on challenging parts we went through and my prediction for what will happen on the final day of the egg drop..

The most challenging thing we found on this project has been trying to make improvements to our lander. This might seem like I'm saying our lander is perfect, but no, I'm actually saying how we could figure out how to fix the problems. But we finally came through after fixing up holes on our lander box.

I honestly think that our egg will have a pretty big chance of survival, regardless if it lands sideways or correctly. This is because our egg is packed into place by foam peanuts. There are also shock absorbers on the bottom and side of our lander, this was a last minute idea we made. I hope for the best for Esperanza, our egg (can you find the pun?).

Thank you for reading all my blog posts so far. Come back next time for blog post #4.

The Team X Project Blog Post #2

Welcome to blog post #2 of my Team X project. Today we finally completed and tested our first prototype and I must say, It went pretty well. Our prototype landed safely with outs any flips or bounces. We still have to see how it will function with an actual egg, but I'm not too worried about that, given how smooth the lander floated down to the ground.

I think the main that we have going for us here is air resistance. That is the force that makes the lander float to the ground instead of dropping straight down.  We designed our lander to be a little light, so the parachute could actually hold the weight of the lander while floating down.

Another factor we covered is the force that occurs when the lander impacts with the ground. To counter that, we attached foam peanuts inside the box where the egg sits. To be even more safe, we fit the egg upside down exactly into a position where it is surrounded by peanuts. That way it doesn't shake as much and accidentally crack.

I feel that we need to find a way to position the lander so it lands somewhere near the spot-marked-X. Something that we really found easy was using our time efficiently. We worked almost the entire period without taking a break. We even got to test our landers in that same class period.

Something we have learned from our tests is that the way you position the lander actually makes a difference. What we find interesting though is that when we positioned it right above the spot-marked-X, it was the farthest away from the target within all our tests.

This is it for this blog post. Come back next time for blog post #3!

Link to egg drop video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NDPsOD3LgRM

Project X Part 2

Welcome to my second blog post about Project X. Not to be confused with my other Team X Project. This week, I had my first failure. It turns out that after I came back from my vacation, my laptop got infected with a virus so it had to go to repair. I was feeling pretty bummed but I thought of a new idea based on animation, making a comic. This had a catch though. I was going to do mini-stories based on text I got from newspapers. Then illustrate accordingly. I’m pretty sure I’m going to stick to this idea unless I encounter a fatal flaw.

Anyway, onto what I did that day. Mr. Mongardi made us a time-table lay out for us to know when we’re supposed to be done with stuff. For example, I’m supposed to be done with cutting out newspaper text at September 28th. That made me have a sense of organization. After that, we all worked on our individual projects. I cut out some newspaper text and formed about 2-3 sentences. I realized that it’s hard to find text that is actually related without forming words letter-for-letter. That’s why I thought of the idea of doing short stories instead of one long one.

The next class, we did our blog posts as scheduled. This is where I am right now. After writing this blog post, I’m going to work on cutting out more newspaper. This isn't that fun right now but when I get to actually drawing illustrations, I'll be a lot more engaged, interested and absorbed in it. This is it for now. Tune in next time for Blog Post #3.

Charles M. Schulz

The Team X Project Blog Post #1

When I heard that we were going to be starting our Team X projects, I was thrilled. I had already seen the work of other 8th graders from past years (including my brother) so I kind of already had an idea of what we were going to do. I was also determined to beat my brother’s score.

The Team X project works like this. You join a group and decide what materials you're going to use to drop an egg from two heights. From the first floor to the ground floor and from the roof of a building to the ground. There's a catch though. Each material costs a set amount of money and your limit is 80 million dollars.

The reason we did this project was to understand how real life engineers/scientists have to accomplish certain tasks with certain constraints, like money and materials. Along with the obvious learning of how gravity works.

Since I was absent the first day we actually worked on the project with our group, I'm going to write about the second class where we were working. My group was with Julie and Ahmed (Al Wahaibi). When I came to class our group had already decided on a name, The Revival. Our egg’s name was going to be named Esperanza (meaning hope in Spanish). My group thought of the idea of putting the egg in a box with foam peanuts. Straws and string were supposed to be used to attach it to the parachute, which was a plastic cover.

After sketching out the plan and buying the materials, we got to work. We successfully completed building the parachute attached to the straws and the box with foam peanuts, but still needed to do some adjustments, like filling the holes with tape.

Next class I hope to tie any loose ends (literally) and test our project. The thing that I most worry about is that if it will float or not. A small part of me is actually hoping it will be dysfunctional, that way we would actually make some tweaks to our project

Project X Part 1

When I first heard that Media Literacy was my first wheel class, I was excited. My brother had had the same class two years ago, and he made a commercial about a boki bottle.

A commercial about a bottle?... Sounds awesome! I thought.

When we finally gathered up in the MSLC (the Middle School Learning Commons), Mr. Mongardi, our teacher for the class, explained what we were going to do in the course of the first trimester. He said that we were each going to pick a project to do and spend 13 weeks working on it. The project could be anything. After that we brainstormed a lot of ideas. Some were just plain outrageous, for example, an egg costume. Obviously, there was going to be a catch to it. It was that each idea was supposed to be-

1. Creative.
2. Helpful.

I was pretty nervous after that. I hadn’t even come up with a single idea. Of course, I wasn’t the only one. Recognizing our failure at coming up with ideas, Mr. Mongardi showed us a bunch of inspirational videos and slideshows. He even made a survey in which he asked us what we’re interested in, what we do when we’re bored, etc. After all that, I finally came up with two ideas; make a comic book or make a video game. I even considered creating a comic book and a video game mashed together. Coming up with those ideas pretty much washed away all my worries.

The class after that one, we were instructed to customize our blog, the one I’m posting in right now. He also showed us how to put in gadgets (my favorite one is Sally the Sheep.) Finally, we got to some actual work, which is writing a blog post. And that’s where I am now. I’m very excited about creating my project and I hope you will follow my work. That's all there is for now, come back next time for Project X Part 2!

Image Credit: Lindsay Kolowich