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Teacher Toolbox icon Teacher Toolbox - The Purpose of this Section

The purpose of this STEM Lab Seek section is to give students experience building the M.A.D. Box to explore the concept of gear ratios. Understanding gear ratios is important in Robotics and other disciplines because gear ratios affect the speed and power of object movement. Students will explore how gears of different sizes affect turning speed and power. In robotics, it is important to understand how the gears would have to change in order for a robot to move faster or obtain more power for the ability to climb up steep hills or lift heavy objects.

Teacher Tips icon Teacher Tips

Use this image as a point of reference to verify if students constructed the M.A.D. Box correctly and to provide students with a preview of what they are about to build.

Allow students enough time at the end of the class period to note where they left off in their engineering notebooks and clean up their area.

VEX IQ M.A.D. Box build featuring a gear mechanism, demonstrating various gear arrangements and movements.
M.A.D. Box

The M.A.D. Box build will be used for investigating gears and concepts related to gears.

                       

Teacher Toolbox icon Teacher Toolbox

The Seek section of the STEM Lab guides students through building the M.A.D. Box, which will be needed for the rest of the lab to explore the concept of gear ratios. If you or your students have already built the M.A.D. Box and have gone through the questions on the Exploration page, you can skip down to the Play section of this STEM Lab and continue from there.