EiE: See Yourself in STEM, Lesson 3

Engineering Design Challenge

The five lessons in this collection were designed by EiE and Pear Deck to support this year’s Engineering Design Challenge, “See Yourself in STEM.”  

To better allow educators and students to see themselves in STEM, the Museum of Science and EiE have developed an engineering design challenge that focuses on plastic. The following slides explore how plastic is made, plastic’s environmental consequences, and the benefits of making plastic biodegradable.

Challenge Context

In this challenge, learners explore the properties that make conventional fossil-fuel-based plastics both useful and harmful. They design bioplastics with similar useful properties, but fewer harmful ones.

In Lesson 3, students will investigate results, imagine possible bioplastic designs, then plan and create one design.