Forces of Flight
By Travis West, Extension Educator, 4-H Youth Development, Vinton County
What kid has not tried to make the best paper airplane and tried to outdo their friends? We are all competitive and want to make our plane fly the furthest or do a cool trick. Working hard and testing new designs is the name of the game and we want to reward kids for their tenacity to engineer a better model. During afterschool aerospace programs, I see folding, refolding, cutting, frustration, and pieces of paper flying during the aerospace activities. Understanding Newton’s Laws of Motion is important to success, but for those that are not science lovers that language makes us want to tune out. How do we get those that don’t “love” science to learn how it relates to engineering and their success in building paper airplanes?
There are 4 simple concepts that will help us engineer a paper airplane that challenges our competitors. Exploring the forces that act on a flying object in the air: Drag, Gravity, Lift and Thrust will give us information about engineering that flying object. Conduct the following activities to reinforce these concepts:
- Drag – Air Engines (Aeronautics: An Educator’s Guide, p.13)
- Gravity – Rotor Motor (Aeronautics: An Educator’s Guide, p.74)
- Lift – Experiment 3 (Science Fun with Flight, p.8)
- Thrust – Experiment 5 (Science Fun with Flight, p.11)
References:
Horton, B. (2206). Science Fun with Flight. Ohio State University Extension. Can be purchased at http://extensionpubs.osu.edu
National Aeronautics and Space Administration. (2002) Aeronautics: An Educator’s Guide with Activities in Science, Mathematics, and Technology Education (NASA Publication No. EG-2002-06-105-HQ). National Aeronautics and Space Administration. https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/58152main_Aeronautics.Educator.pdf
