Building Models - Plate Boundaries

I recently had my small group of students in a science investigations elective research and build plate boundary models. The goal of the activity was to have students use clay (or other materials if they wished) to create a representation of not only the movement of the plates but also the outcome on Earth's surface. Luckily having this extra class I could devote four class periods to the project. The part my students enjoyed the most was the modeling stages. Using clay was a huge motivator for them. Where they struggled was in the planning stages and the determination of how the actually create a three-dimensional model from an image online. There were many on-the-spot alterations needed as students realized that their original design needed to be changed to fit the limitations of their materials.