Future Cities Engineering: Early Engineering Interventions in the Middle Grades
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| Audience/Grade: | 6-8 |
| Discipline(s): |
Architectural Engineering Construction Engineering Engineering Education Research |
| Special Topic(s): | |
| Learning Resource Type: |
Teaching - Educational Game |
| Media Type: |
WWW |
| Author(s): |
Camille McCue David James |
| Description: | Interactive paper in: Advances in Engineering Education - Summer 2008 - Volume 1 - Issue 2. It has 1 video that demonstrate the courseware: Video: Figure 3. Students captured snapshots at various stages of city evolution in SimCity 3000 Unlimited. Abstract: This paper describes qualitative and quantitative research conducted with middle school students participating in a Future Cities Engineering course. Insights were sought regarding both affective and cognitive changes which transpired during the one semester schedule of activities focused on modeling the infrastructure of a city built 150 years in the future. Modeling activities consisted of both a computer simulation, SimCity 3000 Unlimited, and the construction of a physical scale model depicting student visions. To determine the efficacy of SimCity in serving as a realistic modeling tool, the software was “ground-truthed†by comparing Sim dimensions to the dimensions of analogous objects (roads, water pipes) in the real world. An age-appropriate attitude survey was developed and administered with the goal of measuring student disposition towards the engineering profession. Additionally, a multiple-choice content test was developed and administered both pre and post instruction to obtain a quantifiable measure of student learning. Findings show that student participation in such a course can lay favorable foundations for appreciation of and participation in the engineering profession." |
| Rating: |
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| Related Resources | |
| Keywords: | AEE Advances in Engineering Education middle school engineering interventions future cities engineering |
| Is Component of: |
Advances in Engineering Education - Summer 2008 - Volume 1 - Issue 2 |
| Usage Tip | |
| Use of Resource: |
Conclusions: "The Future Cities Engineering course proved to be a successful venture in providing middle school students opportunities to work as junior civil engineers on real-world challenges. Students experienced both the technological and hands-on components of engineering practice by computer modeling city infrastructure via SimCity and by constructing physical scale models of futuristic cities. Cognitive measures showed that the mean group score on a content exam rose by 28.4% from pretest to posttest. A survey of engineering attitudes showed that students perceived participation in the course as having favorably impacted their feelings towards engineering, with one exception: most students did not believe that working as engineer would yield sufficient financial rewards." |
| Difficulty: |
Medium |
| Interactivity Level: |
Medium |
| Version Info | |
| Publication Date: | September 2008 |
| Platform/Format: |
WWW |
| Cost: |
Free |
| Download URL: | http://advances.asee.org/vol01/issue02/04.cfm |
| Metadata: |
IEEE LOM Record |
| Collection: |
Advances in Engineering Education
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