As it turns out, a bit of education can create the know-how to not only make a cardboard boat float, but enable said boat to hold a few people and bring them to the other side of a pool.
Grade 8 students from the Prairie South School Division were able to see that idea in action in boats they themselves built during the Cardboard Boat Races at the Kinsmen Sportsplex Thursday and Friday.
“This is part of the Grade 8 science unit, called the buoyancy unit, and over the past month schools from all over Prairie South have been taking the unit and then the schools come here and design, develop and create prototypes,” explained event organizer Brett Young. “Then we give them the materials, a few scraps of cardboard, to customize a boat that will go across the pool.”
The youngsters had varying levels of success, with some boats disintegrating the second they hit the water and others not only making it across the pool but taking on another passenger and staying afloat for two minutes or more to gather extra points for their team.
“It’s all based on weight, size, height, everything that keeps a boat afloat,” Young said. “It’s all fun, because you’re testing a hypothesis. You’re seeing if this could actually work, can we actually do this. Some of them, you look at them and think ‘no way is that going to float’ and they do just fine. And some others look awesome and sink right away.”
There’s also the social aspect of the whole adventure, with so many schools involved in the program.
“The past two days we’ve had students from all over Prairie South, and these students are meeting other Grade 8s who have taken the same material and are here for the same purpose,” Young said. “So they’re meeting new kids and that’s awesome.”
All in all, Young felt the activity did exactly what it was expected to do from top to bottom.
“I’m really proud of them,” he said “The nice thing is I get to work with the teachers, they’re providing the content in the class and my job is to bring the materials and once we say go, the kids just do their own thing and it’s great to watch.”
