Spaghetti Towers And Spaghetti Earthquakes - What Are They, And Where Can I Find Out More About Them?

Spaghetti towers are scale model towers (usually several feet tall) made entirely out of dry spaghetti and marshmallows (usually the "mini" size)—either as part of an organized competition—or else as a fun thing for kids to do on a rainy day. Just like building spaghetti bridges, building the towers can be a fun learning experience. One thing about the towers, though, is that they are easier for kids of (practically) all ages to successfully build than the bridges are.

With younger kids, the object is often simply to build a tower as tall as possible that won’t fall over. As they get older and are looking for more challenge, they can try building towers that will hold the most weight without collapse. And last but not least, they can try building (and testing) towers to survive a spaghetti earthquake of ten seconds or longer.

Spaghetti earthquakes are induced by using a specially made “shake table” that simulates an actual seismic event on a scale relative to the tower size. The table top typically rests on a series of springs that restrain it somewhat, but still allow movement in all 6 directions (back-and-forth, side-to-side, and up-and-down). Then some kind of motorized vibrating device is used to “shake” the table in rapid cyclical motions.

If you are interested in organizing any of these kinds of activities, following are some helpful online resources to help get you started.

If your goal is to build an award winning tower of spaghetti (perhaps one that can survive the great spaghetti earthquake), you too can find some useful information at some of the following links.

Spaghetti Tower Fun For Kids

a fairly simple description (with some helpful pictures) of how to get the younger kids started building towers from spaghetti at home just for fun on a “rainy day.”

Spaghetti Tower Middle School Lesson Plans

Here are two helpful descriptions of classroom spaghetti tower competitions, in “lesson plan” format, suitable for use at the middle school level. Note – only very basic tower design guidance is included at these sites.

1) Mr. Bucci of Pomona Middle School shares his lesson plan for putting on a team-based competition to build the tallest tower.

2) The University of Colorado provides a lesson plan for putting on a team-based competition to build the tower that can support the greatest load.

Spaghetti Earthquake Contest Info

These sites each provide a number of links with guidance on how to design towers. They also describe in detail (each with a few variations of their own) a complete spaghetti tower-building contest program, in which teams of three to five kids each compete to build the best tower and test them on shake tables. See Paul Elliot’s site for how to build the shake table.

1) Paul Elliot’s “Spaghetti Earthquake Webquest” is perhaps the premier resource on spaghetti earthquake competitions. He explains his program in great detail, and provides lots of links to information on seismic design. His “Notes to Teachers” page provides information on how to make a "shake table" for your contest, and shows pictures of some award winning tower designs.

2) Here is Mrs. Fisher’s variation of the Paul Elliot spaghetti earthquake contest.

3) And here is Mrs. Oregan’s version of the Paul Elliot spaghetti earthquake contest.