Building Toothpick Bridges (Math Projects: Grades 5-8)

As a classroom middle school math teacher, i used this book to do a total unit on bridge building. I incorporated literature, science, and math. The fact that students must work in groups is great, and helps in team building. I went beyond the book, and had bridge engineers come to class to work with my students. WE did reports on famous bridges across the world and read books about famous bridges, such as the Brooklyn Bridge and the Roebling family. The students design and build toothpick bridges and then we have a bridge breaking day to see which bridge can hold the most weight. It is one of those projects that inspires students and each year upcoming students look forward to the challenge. I love this book!

A great beginning book for toothpick bridge building. Has some history and types of bridges included. Will be basing a short teaching unit on this around the information in the book.

a great easy to follow outline and curriculum..great for a center or family activity.

Great end-of-the-year activity for my 5th graders.

Had a high school project, book was ok for ideas but had better luck going off line for material. Material didn't seem relevant for bridges under 100 grams.

This is a simple pamphlet of about 32 pages. It has very little in the way of actual instruction in the making the bridges. It would be good if you can make a bridge but have no idea how to explain the process to kids. It talks about a job each student in a group would have, has some reproducible copyfree pages, but no instructions on how to make a good bridge. It does mention different kinds of bridges, but only has pictures of the sides, no visuals of the decks. I wish I had been able to see a copy of this "book" before I bought it. I could have saved $8.

Great project for my students.

Though there were templates to reproduce.