(June 15, 2017) Following a successful test launch last year, 45 students from Snow Hill Middle School swarmed the Pocomoke River last Friday to test the limits of cardboard and packing tape.
Forty-five eighth graders and 21 custom-designed vessels accompanied their teacher Denis Jenkins for the school’s second-ever cardboard regatta event.
Jenkins said the boat-building exercise is the culmination of three years of technical education imparted in the “Project Lead the Way” class he teaches.
“We go through the entire design process basically from idea to prototype,” he said.
The nonprofit organization Project Lead the Way develops STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) curricula for students from K-12.
“You need to design it, you need to research it and prove why its going to work,” he said. “Then you need to build it and test it.”
Since the beginning of May, Jenkins’ students have completed the task list, finally arriving at the testing phase on Friday.
It turned out to be a mixed bag of results for the youthful ship builders.
LaBroya Pitts said despite investing nearly three weeks constructing his vessel, the river nearly swallowed it whole.
“It almost sunk,” he said.
Jessica Wilson managed to remain dry after averting a near nautical disaster.
“The only problem we had the bottom of our boat had a hole in it,” she said.
Jenkins said lessons learned from last year’s aquatic adventure were applied to good effect.
“Last year a lot of kids were doing butt joints, which is just connecting the two pieces together and sealing it with tape where you’d have your vertical and horizontal fold,” he said.
After reassessing, this year students made a crucial discovery.
“This year what they were doing was using the natural fold of the box instead of the cut and that alone probably solved 50 percent of the problems,” he said.
Reevaluating materials also improved buoyancy, Jenkins said.
“Last year we used primarily all duct tape,” he said. “The rules were just cardboard and tape, so whatever kind of tape you want to use and whatever cardboard you want to use.”
Jenkins said during this go-round, the students steered away from duct tape.
“The switch to clear tape really helped also,” he said. “The clear tape is really the trick to doing the water sealing.”
In addition to insights regarding materials, Jenkins said students learned a variety of STEM related principals.
“This incorporates all that because they used Archimedes’ principal, which is the science and the math, and then they did the engineering to design the boat,” he said.
Additionally, Jenkins noted prior to constructing the boat, students had to design blueprints involving precise measurements.
“Almost every project that we do follows the same parameters,” he said.
Moving forward, Jenkins hopes to partner with Snow Hill and Michael Day, economic development director, to expand the event to include an adult competition.
“It’s starting to catch some notoriety in the town,” he said. “I was going to approach him (Day) about that to begin with, but he actually approached me.”
One participant, Zachary Nock, offered sage advice for future cardboard boat designers.
“Make sure you tape it more and build it better,” he said.
Forty-five eighth graders and 21 custom-designed vessels accompanied their teacher Denis Jenkins for the school’s second-ever cardboard regatta event.
Jenkins said the boat-building exercise is the culmination of three years of technical education imparted in the “Project Lead the Way” class he teaches.
“We go through the entire design process basically from idea to prototype,” he said.
The nonprofit organization Project Lead the Way develops STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) curricula for students from K-12.
“You need to design it, you need to research it and prove why its going to work,” he said. “Then you need to build it and test it.”
Since the beginning of May, Jenkins’ students have completed the task list, finally arriving at the testing phase on Friday.
It turned out to be a mixed bag of results for the youthful ship builders.
LaBroya Pitts said despite investing nearly three weeks constructing his vessel, the river nearly swallowed it whole.
“It almost sunk,” he said.
Jessica Wilson managed to remain dry after averting a near nautical disaster.
“The only problem we had the bottom of our boat had a hole in it,” she said.
Jenkins said lessons learned from last year’s aquatic adventure were applied to good effect.
“Last year a lot of kids were doing butt joints, which is just connecting the two pieces together and sealing it with tape where you’d have your vertical and horizontal fold,” he said.
After reassessing, this year students made a crucial discovery.
“This year what they were doing was using the natural fold of the box instead of the cut and that alone probably solved 50 percent of the problems,” he said.
Reevaluating materials also improved buoyancy, Jenkins said.
“Last year we used primarily all duct tape,” he said. “The rules were just cardboard and tape, so whatever kind of tape you want to use and whatever cardboard you want to use.”
Jenkins said during this go-round, the students steered away from duct tape.
“The switch to clear tape really helped also,” he said. “The clear tape is really the trick to doing the water sealing.”
In addition to insights regarding materials, Jenkins said students learned a variety of STEM related principals.
“This incorporates all that because they used Archimedes’ principal, which is the science and the math, and then they did the engineering to design the boat,” he said.
Additionally, Jenkins noted prior to constructing the boat, students had to design blueprints involving precise measurements.
“Almost every project that we do follows the same parameters,” he said.
Moving forward, Jenkins hopes to partner with Snow Hill and Michael Day, economic development director, to expand the event to include an adult competition.
“It’s starting to catch some notoriety in the town,” he said. “I was going to approach him (Day) about that to begin with, but he actually approached me.”
One participant, Zachary Nock, offered sage advice for future cardboard boat designers.
“Make sure you tape it more and build it better,” he said.