Paper Authors

Abstract

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

An Evaluation of the DTEACh Robolab Summer Institute for 2004 – Assessment of Instructional and Hands-on Learning Correlated with MBTI types

Dan Jensen Kris Wood & Rich Crawford Kathleen Crowe US Air Force Academy Univ. of Texas, Austin Technology Coordinator Dept of Engr Mechanics Dept. of Mechanical Engr. Pflugerville Independent Dan.jensen@usafa.af.mil School District

1. Overview of the Institute During a 2 week period the summer of 2004, the University of Texas at Austin (UTA) hosted the DTEACh ROBOLAB Automation and Control Institute. The institute is sponsored by National Instruments; the maker of the ROBOLAB software. During the institute, a group of 28 K-12 teachers spent 2 weeks at UTA learning how they could integrate Lego® Mindstorm products, which are controlled by the ROBOLAB software, into their classrooms. Each K-12 teacher received a Lego® Mindstorm kit and the ROBOLAB software. Approximately ½ of the teachers had previous experience using ROBOLAB in their classrooms. One goal of the institute is to provide a way to integrate technology into K-12 classrooms in a manner that incorporates extensive active learning. The Lego Mindstorm framework provides an extensive hands-on environment for accomplishing this goal. The incorporation of hands-on, active learning techniques like this have been shown in the past to provide a tremendously enhanced learning environment 1-9.

Over the course of the two week institute, a series of building/programming projects were completed using the Legos® and ROBOLAB. These projects were arranged in order of increasing complexity and were normally done in teams of two. Typically, the projects were broken into three parts: 1) “lecture” time was devoted to introducing the hardware and software tools needed for that project, 2) the K-12 teachers worked on the “implementation” and 3) each team was given time to “demonstrate” their project and to share specific difficulties and successes. The content lectures (item 1 above) were given by UTA professors who have extensive knowledge in the area of design as well as with the Lego® products and the ROBOLAB software. The implementation (item 2 above) was facilitated by approximately seven Lego® / ROBOLAB experts who went from group to group helping to resolve special issues related to that project. Also, staff from National Instruments were there daily to ensure that logistics ran smoothly.

In addition, various “special lectures” were given by a number of experts. These lectures were intended to provide the K-12 teachers with additional resources for implementing this technology into their classrooms. Specifically, special lectures were given by personal from TUFTs University (on their extensive Lego® /ROBOLAB web site), by a Lego® representative and by a mentor K-12 teacher, Kathleen Crowe who has extensive knowledge regarding implementation of this technology into K-12 classrooms.

2. Assessment Plan Assessment was accomplished using surveys given at the end of each day. This daily survey had two parts. The first part asked the K-12 teachers to identify, in writing, the best and worst things

1

• Citation

• Format
  • APA
  • APA - LaTeX bibitem
  • MLA
  • MLA - LaTeX bibitem
  • Bibtex
  • EndNote - RIS

Crowe, K., & Wood, K., & Crawford, R., & Jensen, D. (2005, June), An Evaluation Of The Dteach Robolab Summer Institute For 2004 Paper presented at 2005 Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon. 10.18260/1-2--14486