End of Fall

So I have been a bit remiss in my blogging updates, so I will try to catch up right now. I have given two more talks since my last post, and they have centered on examples that demonstrate geometric concepts seen in everyday designs. The students were assigned an end-of-term project that involved creating a "winter-themed" holiday ornament to hang from the ceiling of the classroom, and for the project they had to discuss ten geometric concepts that are evident in their ornaments. So, my talks were about some interesting design projects that I am familiar with, and at the end we listed and discussed at least 10 concepts from geometry that we could tie in.

The first of these talks discussed Humvees, which is a familiar topic that most of the students could understand. I opened up by talking about the characteristics of a Hummer, the commercial version of the military Humvee, and they all seemed to be familiar with the vehicle and many of them mentioned its low fuel economy. I then moved the discussion to the original military vehicle, the Humvee, and discussed its purposes and some of the considerations that designers must take into account. From here, I was able to transition into some research that I did as an undergraduate, of which the aim was to design for safety against buried land mines. The research I did involved experimenting with explosives, which seemed to catch the interest of a lot of the students, and I was able to even talk a little bit about my results without all of them losing interest. After this, I then asked them where they saw geometry in the Humvee, and they were able to come up with most of what I had thought of on their own, which was encouraging. The fifth hour class, as usual, was a little less attentive on the whole, but there was one student in the front who actively participated this time (who normally does not), which was nice.

The second talk was about the Solar Decathlon project that many of my peers at the University of Maryland participated in. This is a project where teams of university students work together to design and build a completely solar-powered house, and they compete against other universities in ten different categories. I began this talk by going back and referencing a previous talk I gave that discussed wind turbines as an alternative source of energy. I then asked what the other big source of renewable energy was, and most of the classes were able to come up with solar as the source. From here, we talked about the technologies that currently help us to harness solar energy, mainly through photovoltaic (PV) cells and rooftop water heating, and I introduced the project. I stressed the interdisciplinary nature of this project and discussed all of the university departments at Maryland that were involved, since I know not all of the students want to be engineers. This was interesting for them, and I got a lot of questions about the technology and the Solar Decathlon in general. As with the previous discussion, I ended by asking the students where they see concepts from geometry in the solar house, and they were able to easily come up with ten concepts.

I had been under the impression that I would only be with Ms. Tran's classes for the Fall term, and these would be some of my last discussions with the class; however, soon after the talk about the Solar Decathlon I was informed that I would be working with Ms. Tran's class for the entire year. I decided that if this is the case, I should try to get to know the students better, so my last class periods were spent helping the students on an individual-by-individual basis with their practice quizzes and homework assignments. I enjoyed this, and I think the students appreciated my help. Many of them are reluctant to raise their hands, but when I come around they will ask questions. Still more are reluctant to even attempt their homework without me standing over their shoulder and telling them that what they are doing is correct - this is a habit that I intend to break during the course of next term. The fifth-hour students responded fairly well to this, and most of them got through the assignment with the exception of three guys who refused to even look at the questions. I will continue to push them through the next couple of weeks in January, but unfortunately the fifth-hour students will not be back with Ms. Tran when they start their new semester, so I won't have much more time to work with them.

Overall, I think this was a successful semester. I feel like I got a good start as I presented the students with some interesting topics and showed them some of examples of what engineering is; however, it may have been beneficial to get involved with them on a more personal basis earlier. Next term I will try to strike a better balance between engaging them with discussions and assisting them with their individual coursework assignments.