Designing earthquake-proof buildings

Year 3 have been learning all about earthquakes - why they happen, where they can happen, the damage they can cause and what some countries have done to counter the effect of a serious earthquake.

As part of our learning, we tried to design buildings which would stay up in the event of an earthquake. We used toothpicks and marshmallows to build our structures and tested them on a tray filled with jelly, to mimic the effect of an earthquake. We realised that tall thin buildings were most likely to collapse. Buildings with a wide base were much more stable!

Tokoni said, " I liked this activity because it was fun and interesting and I learned a lot."

Kunmi said, "I enjoyed building the structure as part of a team and then testing it in the jelly tray. We added lots of support to our building and in our final design it did not collapse."

"I have one word - incredible!" said Henry B.

Orly said, "It was really interesting because the jelly showed really well what an earthquake was like when you shook it!"