Engineering Our World

Colorado School Of Mines, Golden CO

Investigators

Abstract

PROPOSAL NO.: 0230702 PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Skokan, Catherine INSTITUTION NAME: Colorado School of Mines TITLE: Engineering Our World NSF RECEIVED DATE: 06/04/2002 Abstract Engineering Our World The purpose of this proposal, Engineering Our World. is to plan and pilot a program for improving teacher knowledge and student understanding of the concepts of various engineering disciplines and how these relate to their current science and mathematics curriculum. The program will be designed to both engage and educate middle school students through the use of hands-on, inquiry-based experiments in a mathematically rich environment. One unusual feature of this program is the inclusion of teacher workshops and monthly follow-up classroom visits. Another feature is development of a course for pre-service teachers. The existence of this new course will increase the impact of this project in years to come. The focus of the summer teacher workshops will be threefold: 1) to improve the middle school teachers' backgrounds of engineering disciplines and their relevance to physical science and associated mathematical concepts in their current curriculum, 2) to introduce the teachers to techniques for integrating content and learning standards (including content literacy) into the curriculum, and 3) to provide teachers with instruction concerning how to use inexpensive materials to provide hands-on learning experiences in their classroom. . The purpose of the follow-up classroom visits will be to assist the teachers in implementing the hands-on engineering experiments in their classrooms and to respond to teachers' questions concerning science and engineering concepts. In other words, members of the CSM faculty team will become a valuable classroom resource for both students and teachers alike. In parallel with this effort, a program for pre-service teachers will be developed. The University of Colorado at Colorado Springs will pilot a one-semester course for pre-service teachers covering the .Fundamentals of Engineering.. The pre-service teachers will use materials developed through this project during classroom visits with in-service teachers and apply these materials during their student teaching experiences at the middle school level. This proposal is intended to develop/adapt an appropriate set of course material for the teacher workshops and in-class lessons, and to test and evaluate the materials in urban and suburban classrooms. The joint effort of addressing both in-service and pre-service teachers will provide a continuous stream of knowledgeable instructors that can use engineering principals to illustrate the practical applications of science and mathematics to middle school students.