Students learn about fossils what they are, how they are formed, and why scientists and engineers care about them.
Students use wood, wax paper and oil to investigate the importance of lubrication between materials and to understand the concept of friction. Using wax paper and oil placed between pieces of wood, the function of lubricants between materials is illustrated. Students extend their understanding of friction to bones and joints in the skeletal system and become aware of what engineers can do to help reduce friction in the human body as well as in machines.
Students conduct experiments to determine the flow rate of faucets by timing how long it takes to fill gallon jugs. They do this for three different faucet flow levels (quarter blast, half blast, full blast), averaging three trials for each level. They convert their results from gallons per second (gps) to cubic feet per second (cfs).
All of us have felt sick at some point in our lives. Many times, we find ourselves asking, "What is the quickest way that I can start to feel better?" During this two-lesson unit, students study that question and determine which form of medicine delivery (pill, liquid, injection/shot) offers the fastest relief. This challenge question serves as a real-world context for learning all about flow rates. Students study how long various prescription methods take to introduce chemicals into our blood streams, as well as use flow rate to determine how increasing a person's heart rate can theoretically make medicines work more quickly. Students are introduced to engineering devices that simulate what occurs during the distribution of antibiotic cells in the body.
Working individually or in groups, students explore the concept of stress (compression) through physical experience and math. They discover why it hurts more to poke themselves with mechanical pencil lead than with an eraser. Then they prove why this is so by using the basic equation for stress and applying the concepts to real engineering problems.
Students develop and solidify their understanding of the concept of "perimeter" as they engage in a portion of the civil engineering task of land surveying. Specifically, they measure and calculate the perimeter of a fenced in area of "farmland," and see that this length is equivalent to the minimum required length of a fence to enclose it. Doing this for variously shaped areas confirms that the perimeter is the minimal length of fence required to enclose those shapes. Then students use the technology of a LEGO MINDSTORMS(TM) NXT robot to automate this task. After measuring the perimeter (and thus required fence length) of the "farmland," students see the NXT robot travel around this length, just as a surveyor might travel around an area during the course of surveying land or measuring for fence materials. While practicing their problem solving and measurement skills, students learn and reinforce their scientific and geometric vocabulary.
Using the LEGO® NXT robotics kit, students construct and program robots to illustrate and explore the Fibonacci sequence. Within teams, students are assigned roles: group leader, chassis builder, arm builder, chief programmer, and Fibonacci verifier. By designing a robot that moves based on the Fibonacci sequence of numbers, they can better visualize how quickly the numbers in the sequence grow. To program the robot to move according to these numbers, students break down the sequence into simple algebraic equations so that the computer can understand the Fibonacci sequence.
This lesson describes the major components and functions of the immune system and the role of engineers in keeping the body healthy (e.g., vaccinations and antibiotics, among other things). This lesson also discusses how an astronaut's immune system is suppressed during spaceflight due to stress and other environmental factors.
Filtering is the process of removing or separating the unwanted part of a mixture. In signal processing, filtering is specifically used to remove or extract part of a signal, and this can be accomplished using an analog circuit or a digital device (such as a computer). In this lesson, students learn the impact filtering can have on different types of signals, the concepts of frequency and spectrum, and the connections these topics have to real-world signals such as musical signals. Students also learn the roles that these concepts play in designing different types of filters. The lesson content prepares students for the associated activity in which they use an online demo and a variety of filters to identify the message in a distress signal heavily corrupted by noise.
Students learn the basic principles of filtering as well as how to apply digital filters to extract part of an audio signal by using an interactive online demo website. They apply this knowledge in order to isolate a voice recording from a heavily noise-contaminated sound wave. After completing the associated lesson, expect students to be able to attempt (and many successfully finish) this activity with minimal help from the instructor.
In this activity students will learn the basic concept of Global Positioning Systems (GPS) using triangulation and measurement on a small scale in the classroom. Students discover how GPS and navigation integrate mathematic and scientific concepts to create a standard for locating people and objects. This activity helps students understand both the need for and methods of navigation.
Students create their own simple compasses using thread, needle and water in a bowl and learn how it works.
In this activity, the students will investigate a variety of plants and animals common to the Amazon through research. They will determine the plant or animal characteristics that make them edible or useful for the trip and learn to categorize them by comparing similarities and/or differences.
Students further their understanding of the salmon life cycle and the human structures and actions that aid in the migration of fish around hydroelectric dams by playing an animated PowerPoint game involving a fish that must climb a fish ladder to get over a dam. They first brainstorm their own ideas, and then learn about existing ways engineers have made dams "friendlier" to migrating fish, before being quizzed as part of the game.
To become familiar with the transfer of energy in the form of quantum, students perform flame tests, which is one way chemical engineers identify elements by observing the color emitted when placed in a flame. After calculating and then preparing specific molarity solutions of strontium chloride, copper II chloride and potassium chloride (good practice!), students observe the distinct colors each solution produces when placed in a flame, determine the visible light wavelength, and apply that data to identify the metal in a mystery solution. They also calculate the frequency of energy for the solutions.
Students are introduced to the important concept of density with a focus is on the more easily understood densities of solids. Students use different methods to determine the densities of solid objects, including water displacement to determine volumes of irregularly-shaped objects. By comparing densities of various solids to the density of water, and by considering the behavior of different solids when placed in water, students conclude that ordinarily, objects with densities greater than water sink, while those with densities less than water float. Then they explore the principle of buoyancy, and through further experimentation arrive at Archimedes' principle that a floating object displaces a mass of water equal to its own mass. Students may be surprised to discover that a floating object displaces more water than a sinking object of the same volume.
This lesson introduces students to the important concept of density. The focus is on the more easily understood densities of solids, but students can also explore the densities of liquids and gases. Students devise methods to determine the densities of solid objects, including the method of water displacement to determine volumes of irregularly-shaped objects. By comparing densities of various solids to the density of water, and by considering the behavior of different solids when placed in water, students conclude that ordinarily, objects with densities greater than water will sink, while those with densities less than water will float. Density is an important material property for engineers to understand.
Students discover fluid dynamics related to buoyancy through experimentation and optional photography. Using one set of fluids, they make light fluids rise through denser fluids. Using another set, they make dense fluids sink through a lighter fluid. In both cases, they see and record beautiful fluid motion. Activities are also suitable as class demonstrations. The natural beauty of fluid flow opens the door to seeing the beauty of physics in general.
Students experience firsthand one of the most common water treatment types in the industry today, flocculants. They learn how the amount of suspended solids in water is measured using the basic properties of matter and light. In addition, they learn about the types of solids that can be found in water and the reasons that some are easier to remove than others. Encompassing the concepts of force and motion, attraction and repulsion of charged particles, and properties of matter, during the associated activity students see scientific concepts they already understand through the eyes of engineers who apply them to the removal of solids from water via chemical flocculants.
Students learn how to use and graph real-world stream gage data to create event and annual hydrographs and calculate flood frequency statistics. Using an Excel spreadsheet of real-world event, annual and peak streamflow data, they manipulate the data (converting units, sorting, ranking, plotting), solve problems using equations, and calculate return periods and probabilities. Prompted by worksheet questions, they analyze the runoff data as engineers would. Students learn how hydrographs help engineers make decisions and recommendations to community stakeholders concerning water resources and flooding.