Forces of nature

Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Instructor Brian Leonard and several 4th hour Industrial Technonogy students watch as a marble makes its way through the twists, turns and funnels of "Mid Life Crisis" during the roller coaster time trials held Tuesday, Dec. 21 at the Nevada High School.

The end of the fall semester in the Nevada High School Industrial Technology class of Brian Leonard was the end of a month-long race to the finish line. Actually, the race was to the bottom; the bottom of student constructed roller coasters.

In the end, 4th hour students Devion Leavell, Braydon Nickell and Michael Roof bested 43 of their fellow students with an average time of 77.746 seconds with the roller coaster named Rollerball. The competition consisted of 16 teams, which all constructed their coasters from construction paper. Each team had to use the paper and cellophane tape to create a framework of beams and columns that would support a series of turns and loops and tunnels designed to make a marble stay on the track as long as possible.

Every team had to put its roller coaster to the test six times during the time trials held on Tuesday, Dec. 21. They could toss one score or use it to replace a zero if the marble stopped or fell off. The average of the five remaining runs determined the victory. Each class had its winners ranked and the highest average time was recognized as overall winner. The longest time for a marble on the roller coaster was also recognized. The seventh hour team of Trey Ast, Willie Morris and Bryan Fleener kept their marble on "Demon/Trey's Road" for a total elapsed time of 86.12 seconds.

Morgan Collins starts the marble down "Candy Mountain" during the time trials of the roller coaster competition held in Brian Leonard's Industrial Technology class at the Nevada High School on Tuesday, Dec. 21.

Students could be as creative as they wished and some even ran their marble into and back out of the columns or beams of the structure. Leonard said one objective of the lesson was learning "teamwork," but student Morgan Collins said he also learned a lot about "the structural building of roller coasters." The activity was important to the students as a semester project as well.

The winning team in each class received an A for the semester and other teams received a grade corresponding to their place; however no team or student received less than 70 percent of the possible grade.

The longest time on the track winners will be given a pizza certificate, according to Leonard.

Each coaster had to be named and the names as well as the elaborate designs showed that students enjoyed the exercise. "The Ride of Death" competed against "Lightning" and "Behemoth" during the fifth hour class while "John Wayne" battled it out with "The Thunder From Down Under," "The Tapes of Time" and "The Rolling Stone" in the third hour class.

Leonard said that even though his students work with some electronics, do a flight simulator use lasers and learn Computer Assisted Drafting and Design, this is the most popular activity in his classes. "I almost have more fun teaching this class than the students do," he said.

The framework is the same on each coaster, so the difference comes in the twists and turns that students incorporate into them.

"It took a lot of trial and error to get things right," said Leonard.

That's part of what senior Austin Denning liked about the class. "There's a lot of hands-on in this class."

There was a lot of competition between class mates. Even while watching one of his competitors marble roll slowly down a long run, Denning looked at the coaster's builders and said, "we're probably gonna win."

Leonard seemed to think that all of the students were winners.

"I have been highly impressed with these students and some of the levels they've reached." he said.

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