In the Spinning Tops unit, designed for grades 2-3, students are introduced to a real-world problem: a toy inventor’s top wobbles and quickly falls over. It’s up to the class to figure out why and design a top that can spin for five seconds or more.

Through a series of four hands-on, standards-aligned investigations, students explore how balance, weight, friction, and shape affect a top’s motion. They spin washers, test toy tops of different designs, and then tinker with top models by adding weight or experimenting with different shapes to see how these changes affect balance and spin time. Just like scientists, they ask questions, carry out fair tests, collect and analyze spin data, and construct explanations from their results. Along the way, they see how a well-balanced top spins smoothly, how an unbalanced top wobbles, and how friction eventually slows every top.

In the final four lessons, following the Engineering Design Process, students work in
partnerships to design and build their own toy tops. Just like engineers, they brainstorm
solutions, sketch ideas, build prototypes, and then test, refine, and present their creations. The final tops–built from cardboard, dowels, washers, and markers–spin smoothly, are fun to play with, and showcase how scientific understanding and creativity combine in imaginative, functional designs.