Super Tops

It's time for a spin-off!

Now that your students have tried all of the Tops activities and experimented with the size, weight and other variables involved in top design, they can use everything they’ve learned to create the ultimate top. This activity also gives students a chance to design how their top will look by drawing or coloring it with markers, colored pencils, crayons, etc.

Preparation

This is the culminating activity in the Tops series. Try all of the other activities, starting with Tops (click here), before trying this one.

Place all materials on a table at the front of the room. You can cover the tables that your students will be working on with chart paper, butcher paper or newspaper. Make sure to tape this paper down.

Resources

Figure 1

Figure 2

Suggested Materials

Small (6”-8”) Chinet or other heavy duty paper plates (200)
Large (10”-12”) Chinet or other heavy duty paper plates (200)
Pencils (30)
Small binder clips (200)
Pencil sharpener
Stopwatches (10) or a clock with a second hand
Markers, colored pencils, crayons

Opening Discussion

Ask your students about their last experience making tops. What did they discover about heavy tops vs. light tops? Add these observations on a piece of chart paper or a chalkboard to the lists you created in earlier Tops activities. Were there any new variables they discovered that they can change to make their top spin differently? Add these to the list as well. Present them with their challenge.

The Challenge

Using everything you have learned about building tops, build a top that spins for as long as possible, using any materials you want! Then, color or decorate you top so it looks just like you want it to.

Doing the Activity

Divide your class into teams of 3 for this activity.
Have each team choose a materials manager—that student should talk to their team about what materials they would like to use, then come up to the materials table and gather what they need.
Challenge children to build the longest-spinning top that they can. Encourage them to decorate their creations as they make their super tops!

Let’s Talk About It

After 10 minutes, bring your students together away from the materials to talk about what they have discovered. Have they decided to use wide or small plates, or a mix of the sizes? How many plates are they using? How long do they think their tops will spin for?

Build On What They Talked About

Have your students return to their construction. Let them build, test and decorate until everyone has completed their best top.

There are many ways to have students share their creations. Here are two suggestions:

Have each team present their top to the rest of the class. Ask them to talk about why they chose the plate size or sizes that they did and why they chose the number of plates that they did. Have them spin their top for the rest of the class to see.
Have a “Spin-Off”! First have teams pick a name for their team/top. If you know how to set up a tournament bracket, fill one out with these team names, randomly pitting teams against each other (you will probably have some teams receive “byes” in the first round). Teams should spin against each other, with the top that stays up longest moving on to the next round.

If you are unfamiliar with brackets, follow this procedure: In Round 1 of the “Spin-Off”, have two teams spin their tops at the same time—the top that spins the longest moves on to Round 2. Have 2 more teams spin against each other until everyone has had a chance. In Round 2, the winners from Round 1 spin off against each other to try and make it to Round 3, etc. until one top stands above the rest. If you have 5, 7, 9, etc. teams in a round, you can randomly select one team to automatically make it to the next round. If you wind up with three teams, randomly select two teams to spin off, then have the third team spin off against the winner.

Suggestions

You can take this activity in many different directions—in particular, encourage children to make tops out of recycled materials they find at your afterschool center or that they bring from home. Some items are easy to make tops out of (CDs, records, serving platters) and others are more challenging. Try lots of different sized and shaped materials out of which to make tops. Depending on what is being used for the body of the top, you may need something other than a pencil as well. Dowels, skewers, etc. can serve as replacements. Some materials to try include plastic or paper bowls, tuna cans, washers, Nerf balls, tinker toys, take-out container lids, wooden spools, metal washers, CDs, vinyl records, serving platters, frisbees, dowels, skewers, etc.
Binder clips work well for these activities, but there are other materials you could try for tightening the plates on the pencils. Rubber washers and door stops, rubber bands and other items work—try them out!
You may notice some of your students clipping binder clips onto the outside edge of their top This may or may not improve their results—let them experiment and have a conversation with the group about whether they think it helps or not. Have them try taping small washers, pennies or nails on the outside edge of their tops, and record whether the tops spin longer, shorter or the same amount of time as it did with no weights.
A heavy, wide, balanced top can spin over a minute, but the spinning technique is key—a strong spin is required. To get these tops to spin that long, you could try using an electric hand mixer to spin the top: These mixers usually have holes where the beaters are inserted. These holes are just the right size for a pencil (the eraser works best, though the tip will fit too). Place the pencil in or on the hole (the eraser may not fit in but will still spin) and turn the mixer on. Make sure to keep the top upright as it begins picking up speed, and when you feel like it is going as fast as it can, pull the mixer off of it and watch it go (See Figure 1)!
Have your students try adding designs to their tops that will make some cool effects when the tops spin. See Tops Templates (Figure 2) for some ideas.