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Inventions

I challenged the students to invent something using an ordinary item, a paper cup. This idea came from the activity, What can you make of it? from the Chicago Children's Museum. I put the paper cup in a bag and told them I had a mystery item that we needed to investigate. I think some of them were a little disappointed when it was only a cup. We talked about which direction the cup should go and why. I have to say it was more difficult than I realized to push the students to think of other ways to use the cup. We passed out scissors for them to change the cup's structure and give it a new purpose. Once we allowed them to use tape, aluminium foil and straws their were able to think of new ideas. It could have also been just allowing more time for thinking and collaborating as well. I have to remind myself that there needs to be discomfort for new learning to happen. Ultimately the time was successful, students used their creativity to form the cup into other items.

List of items created from a paper cup




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