Riding into Winter Break
Physics classes create roller coasters out of paper
February 23, 2023
Before winter break ensued, Mrs. Sartor challenged her physics students to build roller coasters using only paper and tape. Each student got to have fun with the task and name their masterpiece after it was finished. The roller coasters could even be decorated using the students’ creativity.
“The project was a little stressful at first, but it actually turned out to be fun the longer we worked on it.,” senior Abby Sutton said.
The criteria for the project was that it had to take the marble at least 40 seconds to travel down it, but couldn’t exceed 45 seconds or points would be deducted. There was no limit on the amount of paper or tape that you could use. However, the roller coaster couldn’t go past the base that it was on. Meaning that the students had to strategize how they would put together their marble rides.