Design Technology KS2 (Y6)
All the fun of the fair

Activity Description

A High School and its seven feeder primaries worked together on this project. The work used the ‘Fairgrounds’ unit 6C of the QCA scheme of work. The design and technology aspects of the work involved looking at and designing a ride that included a motor and a reversing switch. When the ride was complete, the pupils used Flowol or Junior Control software and interface boxes to program the rides. This linked very well into work they were about to start in their ICT module on computer control.

About the project

The focus school for the project was Keldmarsh Primary in Beverley, East Yorkshire. Beverley High School we works in partnership with its feeder primaries as part of outreach work enabled through Technology College status. The project, which involved a group of thirty mixed-sex and mixed-ability Year 6 pupils, took four afternoon sessions to complete.

The teacher introduced the project to the pupils using a range of source material as imaginatively as possible on the newly installed interactive whiteboard. This was an opportunity to experiment with the board and see how we could use it in this project to link design and technology and ICT.

Preparing for the project

They started by watching a music video that features rides, Shapeshifters ‘Lola’s Theme’, which successfully stimulated discussion on the sights and sounds of the fair. They then looked at a CD-ROM from Focus Educational on fairgrounds, which the pupils were encouraged to come and use during the lesson. This is a useful CD-ROM that includes video clips of rides and lots of information on mechanisms.

The teacher then showed a PowerPoint presentation that included photographs taken at Hull Fair, one of the largest fairs in Europe, which is a well-known local event that many children attend. They also printed out the photos onto A3 paper and laminated them to allow the pupils to study the rides in detail.

Starting Work

Paired up, the pupils began discussing and designing their ride, which had to include a motor. They recorded their investigations and experiments with motors and their design decisions in workbooks. Once they had completed their designs, the pupils worked on their plans for making their ride and decided what resources they might need. Staff at the High School made various supports for the rides, so that the pupils could see how they could create a vertical, horizontal or tilted motor mounting. They created their models of the fairground rides from medium-density-fibreboard (MDF) supports with a hexagonal centre, from which radiated lollipop sticks glued on with PVA, and a motor.

The pupils controlled their rides by reversing switches, which they made from card circles and paper fasteners soldered to connecting wires, which they then attached to the motor and the battery connector.

Classroom Organisation

Working with large groups means that careful classroom organisation is vital. To ease demand for equipment and resources, the teacher gave groups of pupils different tasks to do. For example, while some groups used a fret saw to create the central hexagon, others worked froom an instruction sheet to make a reversing switch to control the ride.

Outcomes

They were pleased that the pupils thought carefully and imaginatively about their rides. They named them, considered who they were for, and produced promotional materials using a word processor.

The finished rides worked as stand-alone items, each with its motor, switch and battery attached. To learn how to control the speed of the motors we discussed and demonstrated the Flowol control program using the interactive whiteboard. Flowol allows you to create ‘mimics’ which are animated control demonstrations on the computer screen. There are a number available with the software, including a set of traffic lights, a lighthouse and a zebra crossing. The lights on the photographs light up’ when pressed. The class became so proficient at dragging and dropping the commands that we had races to see who would be first to produce a routine that made a mimic work!

The pupils worked in pairs, using laptops and FlowGo boxes round the room to write a routine for their model. They used leads with a 4mm jack plug at one end pushed into the motor output sockets of the FlowGo box and a crocodile clip at the other end of the lead clipped onto their models. This bypassed the switch they had made, thus completing the circuit.

ICT resource used: