STEM Projects

My nephews sometimes come over in the summer for a few days during a week and while they are here we often make things.  Sometimes we build boats, robots or masks out of bits of wood and nails.  Sometimes we build cardboard armor and weapons.  Sometimes we paint and sew stuffies.

Last week we built elastic band propelled cars and extending grabbers.

We built the grabbers from broad flat Popsicle sticks and brads, finishing off the grabber heads with painted foam core. They were quite easy to build but the brads would sometime come apart and the expanding scissor action would come apart.

The elastic propelled cars we build from old CDs, juice lids, BBQ skewers, cardboard tubes and small foam shapes as well  as elastics.  Our first attempt failed and we discovered that it was too light.  Our next design had more weight to it and worked great.  Once we had them working, paint and foam stickers were added to make the cars look fabulous.

---