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5 Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

May 8, 2016 by Sarah 36 Comments

Love this post? Then pass it on!

Five engineering challenges for kids – with wooden clothespins, binder clips, and craft sticks!  It’s a simple STEM activity that kids of all ages will love.

Move over, expensive building sets!  These simple materials were a huge hit with my boys.  The first time we got them out, Owen (almost 7) spent well over an hour busily creating all kinds of designs.  And that’s saying something, because out of all of our kids he has the shortest attention span by far.

 5 Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Kids will have a blast just exploring with these materials, and it’s a great activity for hand-eye coordination.  After they have had a chance to experiment with building, expand the activity with these fun engineering challenges!

This post contains Amazon affiliate links.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Materials Used:

We used a train table board as a building surface.

  • Wooden Clothespins
  • Binder Clips – Ours are 3/4 inch wide
  • Colored Jumbo Craft Sticks – 6 inches long

Challenge #1:  Build a structure that can support the most possible weight.

For this one, you could either challenge kids to build a true bridge, or just a structure that supports weight.

Two clothespins with a craft stick between them make great supports for a structure.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

We couldn’t believe how much weight this could hold!  We didn’t keep going to find the capacity on this one, but Gresham built another one that held many, many chapter books (about 25!) before collapsing!

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Then we tried building bridges.  Gresham came up with this design.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Then he tested the strength of his design with books.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Craft Sticks, and Binder Clips

It held 8 books and then collapsed, which was not too bad!

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Then we tried a bridge with triangles in the design (since I knew that triangles are a stronger shape).

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

As expected, this one held a lot more weight.  It collapsed after 13 books.

Five Engineering Challenges

Challenge #2:  Build the tallest structure.

Colored craft sticks make this whole activity a work of art as well as design!

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

This was Owen’s tallest structure that he built completely himself (he’s almost 7).

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

And Aidan’s (age 12.5).  As you can see, this is an activity that works well for a wide range of ages.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Challenge #3:  Build the tallest structure with the fewest clothespins.

It doesn’t seem like it would be possible, but we were able to build structures with only two clothespins at the bottom!

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Craft Sticks, and Binder Clips

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Challenge #4:  What can you build with triangles?

This one was my favorite.  Triangles lend themselves to really neat designs.

Owen started this one, and I made it into a hexagon.  I never would have thought to balance the triangles on the binder clips the way he did, but it worked very well!

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothes Pins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Here is Aidan’s triangle design.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Challenge #5:  Build a domino chain.

Gresham discovered that he could make “dominoes” out of craft sticks and clothespins!

Five Engineering Challenges

Five Engineering Challenges

Then we came up with several designs that didn’t really fit any particular challenge.  The kids just had a great time exploring!

Five Engineering Challenges

Who knew clothespins could be so much fun?

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Order Supplies on Amazon:

  • Wooden Clothespins
  • Binder Clips – 3/4 inches wide
  • Colored Craft Sticks

I am storing our “building set” in a plastic shoebox.  We have about 36 binder clips, 150 craft sticks, and about 50 clothespins.  That has been plenty for three kids building at one time.  If you have a classroom of kids, you might want to get more.

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Also, be sure to check out our Engineering Challenges with Craft Sticks, Cups, and Wooden Cubes!

Five Engineering Challenges with Clothespins, Binder Clips, and Craft Sticks

Filed Under: Ages 5-7, Ages 8-10, STEM Activities Tagged With: Building Activities

« What We Don’t Have: The Joy and Expense of Having Kids
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Comments

  1. Almost Unschoolers says

    May 9, 2016 at 8:24 am

    Okay, I’m in love with this!

    Reply
    • Sarah says

      May 11, 2016 at 8:09 pm

      Aw, thanks! It’s a fantastic project for kids! (And I enjoyed it too!)

      Reply
  2. Pritika Gupta says

    May 13, 2016 at 1:52 am

    This is amazing! I will give the supply and this artcile as as my son’s birthday return gift 🙂

    Reply
  3. Michelle Marr says

    May 22, 2016 at 12:34 pm

    This is such a great idea! My boys have been building huge structures with craft sticks and the hot glue gun. Only problem with that is that they’re permanent.

    When you’re doing projects like the bridge and testing strength, do you wind up with broken pieces?

    Reply
  4. Miksci says

    May 26, 2016 at 10:12 am

    I can’t wait to get the supplies and have my students challenge each other when exams are over. When we let kids create there is no telling what they will come up with and what effect it has on their confidence.

    Reply
  5. Merrilyn Velcek says

    August 7, 2016 at 2:53 am

    great activities for exploring engineering concepts in the classroom. Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  6. Amber says

    November 13, 2016 at 9:51 pm

    My boys are enjoying these challenges. Last week, my eldest was able to make a structure that held 78lbs! He was quite impressed. I have it set up that they can explore with the challenge all week and at the end of the week, we sit down together and do our “final” creation. It’s working out well! Thanks for the post!

    Reply
  7. Andy says

    February 13, 2017 at 11:37 am

    Go to dollar tree. They have all of this for one dollar

    Reply
  8. Kiri says

    June 8, 2017 at 6:45 am

    I did this activity today with a class of 5-6 year olds. They loved it!! Fantastic idea, very engaging and fun. I would highly recommend it. Thank you!!

    Reply
  9. Edda Vargas says

    August 30, 2017 at 3:15 pm

    I really liked it.
    I tried with narrow/regular sticks, and it was harder, but my kids had about an hour of fun.

    Also, cheaper clothes pins don’t balance well by themselves. So, I’ll but a little more expensive ones for next try. ?

    Reply
  10. Keitha says

    November 20, 2017 at 11:12 am

    Thanks so much for sharing your fabulous ideas. My Christmas elf is gearing up for another visit and has decided to leave a box of craft sticks, binder clips, and clothespins with your challenges written on a note. The elf used your blocks, craft sticks, & cup challenges in 2015 and your craft stick chain reactions last year.

    Reply
  11. rogayah abu bakar says

    February 26, 2018 at 1:40 am

    your activities gives me an ideas to teach my pupils about strenght and stability. thank you

    Reply
  12. Safia says

    March 11, 2018 at 3:32 pm

    I m very thankful to you. You give us such a great ideas .I share these ideas with my kids .send me thinking ideas.how ask question to our kids thanks

    Reply
  13. Cathy Hobart says

    June 22, 2018 at 10:10 am

    Your challenges are such a great way for the regular classroom teacher to bring engineering into their classroom!!! So many different ways to create with such simple supplies. Students with all abilities can be successful in their own way. Thank you so much for sharing!!!

    Reply
  14. Debbie Vann says

    February 3, 2019 at 8:11 pm

    I just want to say thank you for freely sharing so many wonderful ideas.I love that you don’t charge and just want to share with the community of educators. I’ve used many of your ideas.

    Reply

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