Conference Session

Teaching Technological Literacy - Engaging Students

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Thomas Howell, San Jose State University; Patricia Backer, San Jose State University; Belle Wei, San Jose State University

Tagged Divisions

Technological Literacy Constituent Committee

this lab and had the students compute conductance so that the Page 15.408.9relationships to diameter and area would be quadratic and linear instead of inverse quadratic andinverse linear. This simplified the task significantly at the expense of having to deal with anunfamiliar unit: mho. This change was a net improvement, and we plan to continue using it.Below are some student questions and the instructor’s answers, which were posted while thereports were being written. Q: How do I find the area of my Play-Doh cylinders? Would it be 10 cm times the diameter? A: The area we need to calculate is the cross sectional area of the

Conference Session

Engineering Courses for Non-engineers

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Bradley Bishop, United States Naval Academy

Tagged Divisions

Technological Literacy Constituent Committee

work in small groupsaddressing fundamental, concrete issues related to the current classroom topic. Using class timefor these thought labs allows the instructor to interact with and guide the analysis as each groupbrainstorms new ideas. During the course, we carry out three thought labs: urban transportation,human genetic engineering in the military, and regulation of nanotech assembler technologies.Students present the results of their small group discussion and lead a Q&A session while theirclassmates perform a peer evaluation. These thought labs result in many novel ideas and bringforward points of view from students who tend to remain silent in a larger group, which leads toa very robust and wide-ranging discussion

Conference Session

Defining Technological Literacy

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John Krupczak, Hope College; David Ollis, North Carolina State University

Tagged Divisions

Technological Literacy Constituent Committee

engineeringLittman/ one 3 2 yes yes yesBillingtonOllis one 3 2 yes yes noRosa 3 quarters 4/q 3 yes yes w/other engineeringShraibati one 3 3Whitman summer 3 4 yes yes yes________________________________________________________________________Course Theme Compared to Instructor Expertise Inspection of the titles and contents of these courses reveals some similarities andmany differences in content. A much clearer picture arises if we