EYE Teacher Workshops 2008

The Engaging Youth in Engineering (EYE) middle school’s math and science teachers are participating in 2-day workshops in July and August to prepare them to teach the new and revised EYE Mini-Units this fall. Anne Jolly and Suzanne McGill, EYE Mini-Unit developers, are joining Judy Duke, the EYE Coach, in leading the math and science teachers from Burns and Denton Middle Schools through their respective units.  Two new units were developed for the fall semester:  “Harnessing the Wind” for the 6^th graders which involves students designing wind turbines to create electricity, and “Engineering Crop Production for a Moon Habitat” for 7^th graders which engages the students in developing a biosphere that will produce needed vegetation for a moon expedition.  In addition, teachers learned about revisions made to two units that were developed last year.  The revised 6^th grade unit is “Engineering for the Three Little Pigs” (about soil composition and impact of weather) and the 7^th grade unit is “Engineering Designer Dogs” (about genetics and probability).  As part of each of the workshops the teachers are exploring ways to use EXCEL to generate graphs from data and for instructional purposes with students. This year the 8th grade teachers will implement their mini units in the 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th quarters.  Be looking for more information on the 8^th grade EYE Mini-Units in future MAEF e-newsletters.   

Regardless of grade level, each engineering mini-unit involves a relevant and engaging application of math and science with implementation in both math and science classes and with the math and science teachers actually co-teaching one day during the unit.  The math portion of the unit often involves measurement, data analysis and developing and analyzing data in graphs, as well as computation with rational numbers.  The new units each have the students using the internet to enhance their understanding of the concepts involved.  A typical EYE Mini-Unit requires about 4 days of instruction during the quarter. Each grade level implements at least three EYE Mini-Units a year.  

Burns and Denton Middle Schools are involved in EYE because they are in the Davidson High School feeder pattern and EYE is initially targeting the elementary and middle schools that feed students to Davidson High School, Mobile’s only state-approved engineering academy.  The long term goal of EYE is to produce high school graduates eager and able to meet the growing demand for technology-savvy and highly skilled workers coming to our area.  The key strategy is to use the engaging work of engineers as innovative problem solvers to “hook” the students at the upper elementary and middle grade levels so they will choose to take the higher level science and math courses and develop the critical thinking and communication skills required for students to be either work or college-ready in the 21^st century.