The Year 7 classes have been working on an exciting Science project. Over the last few weeks, they have been Designing, Building and Presenting Rube Goldberg Machines.
A Rube Goldberg machine, named after American cartoonist Rube Goldberg, is a machine intentionally designed to perform a simple task in an indirect and overly complicated way.
Usually, these machines consist of a series of simple unrelated devices; the action of each triggers the initiation of the next, eventually resulting in achieving a stated goal.
Professor Butts and the Self-Operating Napkin (1931) by cartoonist Rube Goldberg.
Working in small groups, students had to include three simple machines within their project. Examples of simple machines are pulleys, axles, levers, incline planes and ramps.
There was a lot of sticky tape involved in the making of some of the machines, as well as cardboard, scissors, marbles, toy cars, plastic cups, water, paper tissues and even bags of tea.
The machines did not always function as planned and hoped. This tested the problem-solving skills of the students, leading to more testing and adjustments.
The students showed great teamwork throughout the process. They had to be able to explain how the machine worked, present it to their peers and film their work using their devices.
The students were beaming with excitement and pride when finally presenting their project to the rest of the class.
We thank our teachers, Teagan Doyle, Anthony Galati, Tracey Arthur, Leah Stone, Tatenda Mutyora, our Lab. Technician and the rest of the Science team at Our Lady of Mercy College for continuously practising our motto #InspiringLearning.
“In Science, I have been learning about Physics. Our assessment was making a Rube Goldberg Machine (Rube Goldberg was an inventor), using at least three simple machines. Some things that were challenging was getting the right angle to get the machine working perfectly. I loved that you could use your own ideas to make a machine of your own.”
Jesse Munday (Year 7)
Please enjoy this video of our Year 7 students.