Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Trebuchet Toss
Young engineers work in teams to design and build their own trebuchets according to certain criteria; they must be able to launch a mini marshmallow accurately into a pie tin. Background reading material, a planning sheet for trebuchet...
Curated OER
Medieval Catapults
Students design and build a working catapult or trebuchet to explore the concepts of force, motion, and distance.
Urbana School District
Projectile and Circular Motion, Torque
Introduce your young scholars to the concepts of circular motion, projectile motion, angular speed, simple harmonic motion, torque, center of mass, centripetal force, and Hooke's Law with a 86-slide presentation. The circular motion...
Curated OER
Fling It
Students investigate the best design using technology. In this science lesson, students construct a freestanding object with specific materials to be able to shoot a ping pong ball and a marshmallow. They have to adjust and...
Cornell University
Catapults
Ready, aim, fire! Launch to a new level of understanding as scholars build and test their own catapults. Learners explore lever design and how adjusting the fulcrum changes the outcome.
Curated OER
Secrets of Lost Empires II-Pharaoh's Obelisk
Learners identify and analyze how levers work by raising a brick with a shish kebab skewer. Students present their work, explaining what did and did not work, including illustrations of the lever lift from different angles. Learners...
Curated OER
The Catapult
Students identify the advantages and disadvantages of a catapult as a weapon. In this physics instructional activity, students construct their own catapult. They investigate how changing one variable affects results.
Science Buddies
Science Buddies: Effect of Trebuchet Arm Length or Counterweight Mass on Project
A trebuchet is a catapult that uses a counterweight to supply the energy for throwing. They were used in the Middle Ages for attacking castle walls. In this project, you build your own model trebuchet and investigate how design changes...
Science Buddies
Science Buddies: Bomb's Away! A Ping Pong Catapult
With this project you'll send ping pong balls flying through the air with a rubber-band powered catapult. This catapult makes it easy to reproduce the launch angle, and to measure the amount of force applied to the projectile. Armed with...
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Launch Into Learning: Catapults!
Young scholars learn about catapults, including the science and math concepts behind them, as they prepare for the associated activity in which they design, build and test their own catapults. They learn about force, accuracy, precision...
Science Struck
Science Struck: How Does an Ancient and Modern Catapult Work
A short explanation of how a catapult works and some examples of them.