Roller Tests at the Noodle Board

A Model Test in the Kitchen

At a kitchen noodle-making board, a science club examined two small wooden rollers without handles. The rollers were the same size and weight. Students labeled them A and B with tiny ink marks. They wondered whether one roller would make a deeper dent in a soft material. Moving objects have energy, and a change they cause can provide evidence about that energy.

The club used reusable modeling dough, not food. An adult helped make a dough ridge at the end of a smooth, level board. The ridge was wide enough for a roller to strike it straight on. Students marked a 30-centimeter course ending at the ridge. They gently launched a roller before the course began. Their hands left it before it crossed the starting line.

A camera recorded each trip. Students used the recording to find the time from the starting line until the roller reached the dough. Roller A took 2 seconds to cross the course in each trial. Roller B took 1 second in each trial. After each strike, students lifted the roller away and measured the deepest part of its dent in millimeters.

Before another trial, students reshaped the dough using a guide so that its starting thickness and shape matched the earlier ridge. They used the same dough, board, course, and measuring method. They kept the dough at room temperature and checked that each roller struck the center. They changed the launch speed, using a slower launch for A and a faster launch for B. Each roller made three trips. The graph shows the dent from each trip. The club compared the repeated measurements rather than choosing a single dent.