Mission 24
Build a Marble Machine
A marble only rolls downhill, and it falls out wherever two chutes do not meet. Turn the pieces, guess where the marble will land before you let it go, find what spoiled the test, and build a machine that does just what its plan says.
- 5 parts
- 10 to 15 minutes
- Grades 4 and 5
Who is playing?
Each age gets its own version of the story. Any of them is fine to play.
Grades 4 and 5
The School Fair Machine
The job: Build a marble machine that obeys the school fair card, then make the same six pieces score more time.
- The Fair Card With a PlayOwl plan
- Two Drawings With a PlayOwl plan
- Six Pieces, More Seconds With a PlayOwl plan
- The Final Round With a PlayOwl plan
- Fair Day With a PlayOwl plan
For grown-ups: what this mission practices
Spatial reasoning on a squared board (turning and joining pieces into a path), predicting an outcome before testing it, finding the one cause of a failed test and revising a design. Older children build to a specification, compare designs by length, parts and a stated time score, and justify a change.
- Ages
- Five versions, from Preschool to Grade 8. They are different designs, not the same task with other numbers.
- How it is checked
- Every answer is checked by rules the child can see at work on the screen. Any answer that meets them is right.
- Help
- Olly can read any line aloud, give a hint that points at where to look, or show one way. A report says where help was used.
- Time
- Nothing is timed. A part takes a few minutes and progress is saved after each one for a signed-in child.