Kids Learn Through Play: Our Piggy Project

Three Little Pigs week was a success! Our engineering project took some time, but the kids loved every minute of it. Our goal was to build a strong house for our little pigs that the big bad blow-dryer could not blow down.

First, we chose what materials we would make our houses with. We did a short experiment to find out which materials would or wouldn't blow away.

Second, we planned. We discussed what a house was (shelter) and what it should have (floor, walls, a roof and a door). The kiddos had to choose at least two materials and draw what their house would look like.

The next step was to construct our houses. The kiddos started with their two materials and their original design. However, Mrs. C and I helped them problem solve how they could make their house stronger. They could add one or two more materials and had to choose how they wanted to hold everything together. The popular choice was glue. After one child finished his house, I asked him if he was happy with it and he said no. When I asked him why, he responded, "It wasn't what I wanted at first, but I used science to fix it so the big bad blow-dryer won't blow it down."

This kiddo wanted a mobile home so that the pig and his house could escape.

This kiddo's design included a colorful roof and had a couch inside. She chose to use colorful straws and pipe cleaners for the roof and put a cotton ball inside for the pig to sit on. She even glued pebbles down for a stone path.

This kiddo used toothpicks and marshmallow to make a cube. He covered his walls with cardboard so that the pig wouldn't fly out.

This guy wanted to make his house out of stone. Instead of glue, he used clay

This kiddo used toothpicks and marshmallows, but wanted a tee-pee structure instead of a cube. She covered the toothpicks with marshmallows and poked more in anywhere there was space.