5th grade invention ideas?

[Luv Bunnies]

My DS just finished his "Invention Convention" project for 8th grade. His teacher was a little more specific by setting a theme of "Reduce, Recycle, Reuse." The kids had to come up with an invention related to recycling, saving the environment, etc. My DS noticed that our city does not sponsor a household compost program. Some cities have been doing it for years, but our only options for food waste are the garbage disposal, the garbage can (landfill) or a home composting program. In his report, he planned out how the program would work, what each household would do, what the city would do, and how the resulting composted soil could be used or sold. His actual invention was a food waste collection can that contained a carbon filter to trap odors. He used a plastic wastebasket lined with a furnace filter to show what the can would look like. He hasn't gotten the grade yet, so we don't know how he did. However, his proposal was accepted by the teacher which was a good sign.

DS said a few kids in his class had their proposals handed back to them and were told to try again. It seems the teacher was rejecting the really outlandish ideas, or things that obviously already existed. One of his friends proposed a "food duplicator" that sounded like something form the Jetsons. That one got rejected!

 

[scrapquitler]

When my daughter participated in the Invention Convention, many of the inventions were games or toys... Things like board games or card games, for example.

 

[java]

Not to be Debbie downer, but magnets would cause the socks to attach to the metal drum of your dryer, perhaps even pulling them apart. I would invent something plastic to hold socks together, like a paper bag clip.

 

[LittleMissMagic]

Thanks for all the ideas. We're going with the magnetic socks concept, to keep the pairs together in the wash...no more sorting socks.

After having the can-jo shot down, I'm concerned about the teacher's response.

Get this, the neighbor's kid proposed using a balloon to deliver a note from the top of the stairs to his sister in the computer room downstairs. This idea was accepted... I'm really frustrated by that, because I'm not seeing how a balloon is a "new" invention, but a canjo is not.

I'm not enjoying this project...neither is my daughter.

What's ridiculous about this project is that none of these things are inventions - they're innovations. An invention is something brand new - never thought of or done before. There are rarely new inventions. An innovation is an improvement to an already existing invention. Magnets exist and socks exist, so combining the two to create something that keeps them together in the wash is an innovation. And the whole balloon idea is creative, but I don't see how it really see how it qualifies as an invention/innovation either.

 

[shortbun]

My son thought it out and came up with his own. The one that went the farthest at the invention convention was a pair of soccer shin guards that were sewed into the tongue of the soccer shoe so they would not get lost. He was always missing one shin guard. DH gave him a hole punch for the shoe tongues and he used an extra pair of laces to sew them together. Because they could tell it was a real problem and a real solution done solely by the student, he went to the state level but got no award there.