Exploring Kinetic Energy with a Refrigerator Marble Run

Kinetic energy is the energy of motion. Build a refrigerator marble run and have fun exploring how changes in the marble run design cause changes in the movement of the marble. Be sure to watch the video. This post is part of the A to Z Science Experiments for Kids. Check out all of the ideas.

Build a Refrigerator Marble Run

To assemble the marble run, you’ll need the following supplies:

• Craft sticks (we received ours from CraftProjectIdeas.com)
• Magnets (ours were also from CraftProjectIdeas.com)
• Glue (hot glue worked better than white school glue)
• Tape (masking tape or painter’s tape will work well)
• Scissors
• Marble

Each part of the marble run was made using 4 regular craft sticks or 2 regular craft sticks and one jumbo craft stick.

I found that hot glue was the fastest and easiest way to put together the ramp pieces. Aiden liked using tape. I tried using white school glue. It worked just fine but took forever to dry.

Using tape was the easiest for 5 year old Aiden. Tape two craft sticks together. Place one craft stick above and another craft stick below the two taped ones. Leave a tiny bit of space and tape these together as well.

After taping the four craft sticks, fold up the two sides.

Additional tape may be needed to hold up the sides.

Add magnets to the side of your ramp pieces.

Place the marble ramp on the refrigerator. You can rearrange the pieces however you want. Does your design change how the marble falls down? Can you make the marble go slower? Faster?

I cut flat magnet sheets to size. The magnet sheets were not quite strong enough to keep the ramps on the refrigerator when the marble hit them. The force of the impact would push the ramp off of the refrigerator. To solve this problem, we taped the marble run to the refrigerator.

Watch the marble run in action:

More Activities with Kinetic Energy

• Build a Rube Goldberg Machine to deliver cookies.
• K is for Kinetic Energy in the A to Z Science series for toddlers and preschoolers. Explore ramps and learn about the energy of motion.
• Try out these Kinetic Energy Experiments and Activities.

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