Brady Snyder - Fab Learning Academy¶

Field activities¶

Field activity 1¶

Could you have done this activity without the teaching aid you have fabricated? How do you think digital fabrication improves the activity vs utilizing traditional methods? What is the extra value? While I could certainly have prepared for this activity with more traditional fabrication methods, digital fabrication through laser cutting provides several benefits over production by hand. One of the primary advantages is prototyping. This project required multiple prototyping stages to investigate the size and shape of the vectors, as well as looking at multiple methods of connecting the vector pieces together. Another major advantage is the speed of production and the ability to quickly assemble multiple kits with total accuracy to measurements. Additionally, laser engraving allows for the creation of a built-in grid and protractor on the base, which would otherwise have had to be carefully traced or printed on paper.

What are some challenges you expect when you do the activity with your class? Design-wise, one concern I have is the structural integrity of the central peg. Material availability led to me using lower-quality MDF for the 3.15mm prints which could break with use. Pedagogically, my primary concern is initial buy-in, as many Grade 11 students like to pretend that they enjoy playing with toys quite a lot less than they really do. Additionally, I am certain that there may be unforeseen issues with the overall design that may contribute to inaccuracies in measurement. The physical materials will be supplemented by digital and visual representation, so I hope to give students multiple ways of visualising their assigned problems.

What did you learn during the fabrication process? The primary lessons that I took from the fabrication process were learned in the early phases of initial ideation and design, and the later testing phases as well. By this point, I have a fair amount of experience doing vector design and using digital fabrication tools like the laser cutter, but I often struggle to find reasons to use them. Being forced to come up with an actionable lesson plan that uses digital fabrication made me take the time to not just sit down and think through what areas of my curriculum could use a constructed tool, but also to consult with Alec as a sounding board for those ideas and feedback. It was interesting to see the sounding board from the other side, as usually I am the one helping students to develop their own ideas in Design class or in our Grade 9 Science Fair. Additionally, after iterating through several versions of the vector connectors, I consulted fellow physics teachers and some of my students for feedback, which resulted in the final (well, current actually; there’s still plenty of updates I could make to improve the design) version.

Field Activity 2¶

Calculating Forces on an Inclined Plane

How well did the activity align with your intended curriculum or standards, and what adjustments (if any) would strengthen this alignment? Physics conforms well to idealised simulations. Simulation gives a great deal of control over values that is more difficult to achieve with physical props, particularly when it comes to inherent properties like the coefficient of friction. This assignment allows students to learn a bit of programming in order to create a tool that they can use to check their own work in many problems throughout the Dynamics unit, while allowing the instructor to assess their application of the logic of solving a problem of this type. I believe that these aspects make this activity very well-aligned with the learning objectives of this unit, and by extension, with the curriculum.

In what ways did students’ ZPD guide your decisions about pacing, scaffolding, or complexity of the activity? Due to this not being part of a programming course, I felt that it would be essential for the students’ ZPD to weight the activity’s complexity more on the logic of finding the net force and acceleration in the problem rather than in the code. While students can certainly use this assignment to create a detailed code addressing every possibility and able to extend to other inclined plane problems as well (and doing so would likely earn them extra credit), the primary focus is on their ability to translate a mathematical problem into a concrete set of solution steps, illustrated by the code.

What supports did you provide in the lesson plan to support diverse student needs? How did these supports work in the overall lesson? I could have included more detailed scaffolding/supports, but I have included a number of tips for aiding students in starting, including but not limited to presenting them with a simple problem and having them detail each step they had to take to solve it. Walking through these steps is essential for pattern recognition with these types of problems, and for the teacher to see where problem areas are in the logic. In areas of difficulty, in lieu of directly telling the student the following step, instructors can prod them with questions to encourage thinking towards the proper direction.

After testing the lesson, what changes would you make to better meet diverse learner needs or to better maintain the learning objectives? I have not yet had an opportunity to test this lesson, and will report back after having done so.

Field Activity 3¶

To Be Determined

Field Activity 4¶

Wait and See!