Walking on Eggs Experiment

Today the boys were talking about cooking and it quickly turned to breaking the eggs for the cake and the biscuits. This gave me an idea. I had heard of an experiment where people have tried walking on eggs and how they were surprised that the eggs could hold their weight. So, off we went to buy some more eggs and then the boys took turns to try and walk on them.

Walking on Eggs Experiment

To do this experiment, you need a large flat area. We used our garage floor. I laid down a large piece of butcher’s paper, but you could use garbage bags or a plastic drop sheet as well. We had three cartons of eggs, but the middle in a couple of the egg cartons was too high. I took out all the eggs and cut the middle bits from the carton so it would be flatter for the boys to walk on.

When replacing the eggs, I made sure that they were all laying on the same end. All the ‘pointy’ ends of the eggs were put down first into the egg carton which also made the surface more level for walking on. And lastly, I made sure that none of them were broken or cracked either. We placed the eggs on the paper in two rows about walking distance apart.

I had the boys guess and talk about what they thought was going to happen. R thought that if you went too quickly and stood on the eggs too hard, they would crack. So he tried it and his heel went cracked an egg.

So then they decided that you had to be careful and take it slowly. They tried this, one boy helped the other as he slowly stepped onto the first carton of eggs. When they were sure, they let go of their brother and carefully placed their other foot on another carton of eggs.

It was so funny to watch them as all they could think about was the eggs cracking and it may hurt their feet. It took them a little while to work up the courage to actually stand their first foot on the eggs, but once they had done that, they were off.

We only had a few cartons of eggs, if you had more, you could make a bigger ‘track’ to walk on.

How come the eggs don’t break?

It all comes down to the shape of the egg. Eggs are similar in shape to an arch which is one of the strongest architectural shapes. The top and bottom ends are the strongest and the egg carton helped keep these eggs in an upright position.

Other Science Experiment Resources

Check out the full explanation and some other great ideas at Steve Spangler Science.

Walking on Eggs Experiment