Year 6 have been working on the topic of forces, in particular the battle between gravity and upthrust (in water). We designed our own boats out of tinfoil. Our creations helped us to explore what factors would affect how many people, paperclips in this case, our boats would carry. Would it be smaller deeper boats, wider flat boats, or medium boat shaped boats that would prevail?

In the end our most successful boat  held 566 paperclips!! It was very shallow with a large surface area. Why might that help? Ask one of the Year 6 children!