Fairy Tale Engineering with Lower Elementary
- emily29939
- Sep 29
- 2 min read
This year in Lower Elementary Engineering, we’re trying something new! Instead of starting with a problem and then searching for a solution, we’ve been diving into fairy tales first and from there, pulling out an engineering challenge hidden inside the story.
There is so much wisdom tucked into these tales, and they give us a fun way to connect imagination with real-world problem solving.
Along the way, we’ve been talking about what engineers do and how they do it. In real life, engineers:
Solve problems
Design and build
Innovate
And how do they do this? By using math, science, creativity, and teamwork to design solutions to tricky problems. That’s exactly what we try to practice in class: being creative, trying new things, learning from failures, and not giving up.
Three Little Pigs
We began with The Three Little Pigs. Students asked, “How does this story relate to engineering?” Together we noticed:
The pigs experimented with different materials.
They learned from their mistakes.
They helped each other out.
Even the wolf kept trying!
Our challenge: build a house that the “Big Bad Wolf” (aka Ms. Emily) couldn’t blow down.
Goldilocks and the Three Bears
Next, we felt sympathy for poor Baby Bear and his broken chair. Students decided he deserved something better, so they designed and built a strong and stable chair that would be just for him!
Jack and the Beanstalk
With Jack and the Beanstalk, we explored how Jack had to think like an engineer: climbing a beanstalk, sneaking past a giant, and carrying treasures back down safely.
Students chose between two challenges: building a giant beanstalk or designing a contraption to sneak the gold without getting caught!
The Wild Swans
Most students had never heard this story, which opened the door for even more creativity. They had no picture in their minds of what things “should” look like, so their imaginations could run wild.
Students made wings for the swans, nets to safely carry the princess, and one even made a full swan of their own!
Engineering, much like a good story, is all about imagination, persistence, and discovery. Here’s to many more stories shared together in circle!
-Ms. Emily
So creative and fun!