The Great Marshmallow Challenge

Today we did The Marshmallow Challenge. The materials given to each team were a yard of string, a yard of tape, a marshmallow, and pieces of raw spaghetti. The challenge was to see who could build the tallest freestanding structure that would hold a marshmallow at the top. There were five teams in all but the most challenging part was building the structure in general, and how to complete it using the given materials. All of the teams used the same formation which was a pyramid structure. Our group originally tried the design where you stack triangles on top of each other but it didn't work out. However, the structure that won was 18 and 3/4 of an inch tall. At the end, we talked about how multiple people have done the challenge but the people who do the best are kindergartners and who do the worst are business school graduates. This is because the graduates usually think about what the product is going to look like in the end, however, kindergartners think about as they go along in the project. I found it challenging, and it was a good team building experience. I would have found it easier if I were given something to draw on or something to show my plans to my group.