chs250 unit 4 Engineering Design Challenge Assignment

KEY ASSESSMENT
This assignment will require you to plan an Engineering Challenge using the format provided in the
attached “Design Challenge Planning Template”. It must include a state early learning standard, be
developmentally appropriate and intentional in design, and meet the needs of all the students.
Remember to include vocabulary words that will enhance the concepts you are planning. The
requirements for your design challenge are as follows. There are three main pieces.
1. Choose a children’s book. Typically, a fiction picture book for this assignment will work. A good
fiction picture book contains a beginning, a middle and an end. It will also have a problem which will
lead to a conflict, and then possible resolutions and completion with a satisfying ending. There may
be more than one conflict that needs attention. This is where we can see the impact of an
engineering experience.
2. Create a Design Loop
A. What is the problem?
B. Brainstorm solutions.
C. Create the solution you think is best.
D. Test your solution.
E. Evaluate your solution.
Discuss the problem that the story’s characters are experiencing. Consider this example:
Read the story Goldilocks and the Three Bears. After reading the story, the children decide that
Goldilocks needs a new bed. That is the challenge that needs to be solved!
? The class will suggest materials they would need to create a new bed for her.
? They will discuss how materials might connect with each other, what materials are made of, and
specific properties.
These are all important concepts that will make this experience fruitful.
Draw a plan, build or create it, and try it out. The children will need to revise it (reiterate),
making the plan better. They will then be able to show the finished project and explain how it will
work.
Evaluate the solution. Which other STEM concepts did you use?
? Which materials are going to make the bed as soft as she wants? (Science)
? Did you take a picture of the bed with a camera? (Technology)
? Did you measure the space you will need for the mattress? (Mathematics)
3. Family and Community Engagement
Your planned experience needs to engage the family and community. How will you help children’s
families recognize the steps in critical thinking while problem solving an authentic dilemma? Can the
children with their families find items in their homes and/or community that are “too something”?
Examples:
? a book that is too hard to read
? a light that is too bright
? a cat that is too sleepy
? a store counter that is too tall
CHS250 – STEM in ECE

Engineering Design Challenge Assignment & Rubric

Students: Be sure to read and use the template (see separate document). Then read and

use the criteria, by which your paper/project will be evaluated,

before you write, and again after you write.