We really want to instill an understanding of the Engineering Design Process (EDP) in our students. So we decided to have a short unit on this. They, of course, will be using the EDP in all of their projects and hopefully whenever they need to find solutions or create ideas.
We took the "Super Slinger" idea from the Teach Engineering site. We gave a short lecture on the EDP and reviewed each step. Students then had to write their own definitions of the steps. There are a lot of variations of the EDP. Some have as little as four steps while others might have eight or nine. We modified the one we had to just seven steps.
We then had them go through the EDP and work on their slingers. We emphasized that the main objective of the activity was not to build an awesome slinger, but to really think through the EDP and how it was used in this activity.
After testing and evaluating their slingers, we had them write up a more detailed description of what they did in the provided EDP packet. We also asked for a self-reflection on what their team did in each step of the EDP to complete their project.
We took the "Super Slinger" idea from the Teach Engineering site. We gave a short lecture on the EDP and reviewed each step. Students then had to write their own definitions of the steps. There are a lot of variations of the EDP. Some have as little as four steps while others might have eight or nine. We modified the one we had to just seven steps.
We then had them go through the EDP and work on their slingers. We emphasized that the main objective of the activity was not to build an awesome slinger, but to really think through the EDP and how it was used in this activity.
After testing and evaluating their slingers, we had them write up a more detailed description of what they did in the provided EDP packet. We also asked for a self-reflection on what their team did in each step of the EDP to complete their project.
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