Looking for an alternative to piñatas and Pin the Tail on the Donkey for your next kid party? How about inviting your guests to build a Rube Goldberg Machine?

Look up Rube Goldberg in Webster's Dictionary and you'll find this: Accomplishing by complex means what seemingly could be done simply.

Rube Goldberg may be an adjective, but he was also an actual person. Educated as an engineer, Goldberg was a Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist, sculptor and author. But Goldberg is most famous for combining his sense of humor with his knowledge of engineering by creating elaborate machines designed to do very simple tasks. His silly contraptions involved not only wheels, pulleys and gears, but all manner of household items including buckets, balls and even animals.

Goldberg died in 1970, but his legacy lives on. His machines have inspired countless others to create their own contraptions, most notably this one from Chicago rock band OK GO.



Considering that the objective of a Rube Goldberg Machine is to make a simple task ridiculously complicated, we think it also makes for a perfectly silly party activity. Take a page from Goldberg's notebook and let your guests invent their own crazy machine. Read on to find out how.

Before the Party
  • Decide on a goal for the machine that can also serve as the prize. The idea is to make an easy task difficult so think of something simple like tipping over a bowl of candy or uncovering a table full of party favors.
  • Shop around your house and garage for items to use in the machine. Balls, buckets, sticks, tubes, magnets, toys, string...grab them all. Gather them together in a large, open area along with notebooks and pencils.
At the Party
  • Give your guests some time to play with the items and brainstorm how they could be used in a machine. Get them started by instructing them to make of list of each item and what part it could play in a chain reaction.
  • Now that they've got an inventory of parts and an idea of what they can do, have them design their machine on paper. They can either draw a schematic or make an ordered list of each action followed by the next, ending with the chosen goal.
  • Give it a try! Have them assemble their machine as designed on paper and see if it works. If it doesn't, it's back to the drawing board.
Tips
  • If you want to divide your guests into teams, give them each the exact same parts and pit them against each other. Award a special prize to the first team to build a successful machine.
  • For ideas on building a Rube Goldberg invention, check out PBS Kids.