Paper Building Blocks

What To Do

To create paper blocks, each student will:

• On 4 pieces of cardstock, draw rectangles that are 1 inch wide and 3 inches long.
• Cut out all the rectangles - this should make 120 rectangles. 
• Fold 100 of the strips of paper into thirds and tape the open ends together to form triangles. 
• On the last piece of cardstock, draw rectangles that are 3 inches wide and 6 inches long.
• Cut out all the rectangles.
• Arrange a few triangles into a row, alternating between triangles that are right side up and upside down.
• Place a strip of cardstock that you cut (3 inches by 6 inches and/or the extra 1 inch by 3 inch strips you saved earlier) on top of the row of triangles.
• Add another row of triangles on top.
• Repeat until they have a few layers of a pyramid building block structure.
• Have students try balancing a ruler and other objects on top of the structure without the paper blocks bending.
• They can rearrange the paper blocks and strips into different structures/buildings and see which can hold the most weight on top.