Month: May 2022

This week, I presented at the Celebrating Undergraduate Excellence (CUE) research showcase on May 19, 2022. I also spent some time working on a supplemental packet for the Invent-A-Drone lesson.

Presenting at CUE

This week, I spent a lot of time preparing for and presenting at the CUE research showcase. This was my first time presenting at a showcase, and I was excited to present about what I have been working on for the past few weeks. I also got the chance to walk around to see some of the neat research projects of other students from different colleges and departments at Oregon State University.

working on Supplemental packet for invent-a-drone lesson

This week, after hearing about how using the lesson plans to teach some lessons at a local elementary school went, my mentor suggested creating a separate supplemental packet with information about drone technologies and capabilities. This was because, due to time constraints, it was difficult to run the lesson with enough time to go over drone technologies and capabilities as a part of the lessons.

As a result, I worked on creating a supplemental packet so that students can look through it and learn about drone technologies if there is enough time when the lessons are being taught, as well as so that they can reference it for ideas during the Invent-A-Drone activity.

GOALS FOR NEXT WEEK

I hope to review the work I did for the supplemental packet for the Invent-A-Drone lesson with my mentor next week and to see what improvements or additions I can make to it. I also hope to spend some time going back to all of the lesson plans and making any final adjustments. Since the 15 weeks of the URSA Engage program is coming to an end soon, I would also like to talk about next steps after the program with my mentor and how I can continue staying involved with K-12 STEAM research.

This week, I met with Professor Sharon Sánchez-Áragon and finished working on the Physics Behind Flight lesson plan.

MEETING WITH PROFESSOR SHARON SÁNCHEZ-ÁRAGON

This week, I had the opportunity to meet with Professor Sharon Sánchez-Áragon, an instructor in the College of Education at Oregon State. She has background and experience in bilingual teaching for English and Spanish, and I reached out to her to see if we could meet in person to go over the lesson plans.

During our meeting, she gave me some feedback on some small changes to make to the lesson plans, and she also offered to help edit the student handouts that I wrote in Spanish. She also informed me about how I could also reach out to her if I would like to connect with someone in the College of Education to use these lesson plans to teach younger students in some of the programs they have there in the future. I was really grateful for her feedback and help on the lesson plans and to hear about the work that she does.

FINISHING THE PHYSICS BEHIND FLIGHT LESSON PLAN

This week, I also finished working on the Physics Behind Flight lesson plan. I translated the student handout into Spanish, and I finished adding extra notes and instructions for teachers. I also worked on making a worksheet for a supplemental activity where students can make and decorate paper airplanes and then experiment with changing the flight surfaces (such as the wings) to see how it changes the way the airplane flies. This lesson plan was used by my mentor Victor Villegas to teach a lesson at a local elementary school on May 13, 2022.

GOALS FOR NEXT WEEK

With the Physics Behind Flight lesson plan being used to teach a lesson at an elementary school last week, I look forward to hearing from my mentor about how it went. After this, I would like to make any changes to the lesson plan based on what can be improved. A drone workshop using all of the lesson plans is tentatively planned on May 29, 2022 at the Oregon State University Lincoln County Office of Extension, so I would like to make sure that the lesson plans are all ready to be used. I look forward to helping out with the workshop.

This coming week, I will be presenting my research poster at the Celebrating Undergraduate Excellence (CUE) research showcase on May 19, 2022. I am excited to share what I have been doing as a part of this URSA research project, and I hope to spend some time preparing for the showcase this week.

This week, I worked on creating a lightning talk presentation to prepare for the Celebrating Undergraduate Excellence (CUE) Research Showcase, added finishing touches to all of the lesson plans to make them ready for public use, and then continued working on the Physics Behind Flight lesson plan.

WORKING ON A LIGHTNING TALK PRESENTATION

This week, I prepared a lightning talk for CUE. I began working on a PowerPoint presentation, and I also prepared a script. I am looking to practice presenting what I have so far to my mentor next week. CUE will be my first time presenting at a research showcase, so I plan to spend a lot of time over the next two weeks practicing my presentation.

EDITING THE PREVIOUS LESSON PLANS

As a part of my work this week, I also wanted to go back through all of the lesson plans to make sure that they will be ready for public use.

CONTINUING TO WORK ON THE PHYSICS BEHIND FLIGHT LESSON PLAN

Finally, I also continued to work on the Physics Behind Flight lesson plan. My mentor suggested adding a couple more things, as well as finding a good image diagram that shows lift and Bernoulli’s principle to replace one that I originally added to the student handout. I spent a lot of time looking at for diagrams online, and I ended up finding one. However, I was not sure if it demonstrated the concept much better. I would like to show the photo to my mentor this week to see if it is better than the one I originally found. Otherwise, I will try to create my own diagram to add to the lesson plan.

I also tried looking for some standards to list for this lesson plan, but I had some trouble finding standards relating to physics for students in grades 6-8. During my next meeting with my mentor, I would like to ask about what kinds of standards could be related to what is taught in this lesson plan.

GOALS FOR NEXT WEEK

My goal for next week is to finish the Physics Behind Flight student packet, work on the teacher guide for the Physics Behind Flight lesson plan, and then translate the student packet into Spanish. In addition to this, I will also be meeting with Professor Sharon Sánchez-Aragón this week to talk to her about the lesson plans, which I look forward to. I will also continue working on preparing my slideshow and speech for CUE.