For my first Science 10 assignment, we were tasked with doing an experiment in relation towards paper airplanes in which we had to create three different paper airplanes but before doing so we had to create a general question (identifying and stating the question or problem; what do you want to find out?), we had to do some background research on paper airplanes, create a hypothesis on which paper airplane would fly the furthest, write the procedure for the experiment and finally list the materials and types of planes that we would be using.
The first plane that we used was called the hammer (link: https://www.instructables.com/id/The-Hammer-Paper-Airplane/), a traditional simple airplane (link: https://www.instructables.com/id/Classic-paper-airplane/), and finally the “long-distance” airplane (link: https://www.instructables.com/id/Long-Distance-Paper-Glider/).
The results were surprising and shocking because originally I thought that the hammer would fly the furthest but in reality, it turned out to be the traditional simple airplane that flew the furthest. I was shocked by this answer because I’ve made the hammer in the past and it had worked really well flying very far, and sadly it didn’t manage to travel very far this time. The hammer had travelled an average of 6.99 meters out of 5 throws, the original had an average of 7.45 meters out of 5 throws and the long-distance had an average of 7.19 meters out of 5 throws.
From this experiment, I learned to not always depend on your past and the things that you’ve done in the past because like this experiment had shown me, the outcome can always change on the circumstances that are placed in front of you. I also learned that you should always be working smarter not harder because like this experiment the one that had travelled the furthest was, in reality, the most simple traditional airplane. So, it showed me that if you work simple but efficiently at the same time you can achieve the goal just as well as someone who works hard.
As for next time, I would probably modify each paper airplane by either using a bigger paper, adding things such as tape and paper clips to affect the glide and the weight of each plane. Not only that though, but I would also test each plane furthermore by throwing it multiple more times in order to achieve a more specific result because the results can change with just a few more throws. Here I will attach pictures of the paper airplanes that I built down below. Overall I enjoyed doing this as my first experiment, it was a good first introduction experiment for Science and it wasn’t boring or anything so it was good, and I hope we can do some more of these over the course.
The Hammer:
The Traditional airplane:
The “Long-Distance” Airplane:
