Foldable Flight

Foldable Flight is a highly adaptable workshop with simple requirements: it only needs two sheets of A4 paper per participant. Base content was initially provided by Questacon, but I've adapted it to a range of audiences and delivery modes. I've presented it from upper primary to junior secondary; in-person, as an online workshop (via video call to one classroom at a time), and as a webinar (to an unlimited number of classrooms at a time).

In adapting Foldable Flight to a year 7-10 audience at Mount Isa School of the Air, I used personal footage of a flight past a thunderstrom create a sense of awe. I also used the local history of pioneer aviation to appeal to the students' outback identities. The classroom teachers were surprised at how engaged their students were — well beyond usual expectations.

Topics covered

• Parts of an aeroplane
• Flight forces: lift vs gravity; thrust vs drag
• How to fold a dart and glider
• Modifications to the dart and glider
• Making it bigger: the world record paper plane flight; Airbus Beluga XL

Production software used

• OBS Studio for slides and green screen effects
• vdo.ninja for off-site second presenter
• Slido for simultaneous interaction with multiple audiences
• Zoom, or the audience's platform of choice