Physics and Technology Education Teachers Join Forces (and Motion)

Name: Steve Smith and Ken Cole
School: Newburyport High School, Newburyport, Massachusetts
Impact: Tech ed helps students master physics concepts

At a Massachusetts high school, a career and technical education teacher is working with other teachers at the school to create projects that bring scientific theories and principles to life.

Over the past few years, schools have responded to one budget crisis after another by cutting programs and shifting priorities. Steve Smith, a long-time technology education teacher watched with disappointment while his school, like many others, reduced or eliminated industrial arts classes such as carpentry, plumbing and automotive technology. To a certain extent, these moves have made sense. As high school has increasingly become a preparatory step on the path to higher education rather than an end in itself, high schools have shifted away from vocational apprenticeships programs.

Smith who is now a Technology Coordinator and robotics teacher at Newburyport High School in Newburyport, Massachusetts, feels the educational shift handicaps students--and not just the kids who might have used the technology courses as a means of finding or learning a trade. He thinks that some students learn best by doing--putting theory into practice--which is exactly why curriculum in the sciences has laboratory work done in conjunction with the conceptual work done in the classroom.

Difficult concepts that are hard to master on paper can often be easily understood kinesthetically, by touching, feeling, manipulating and thinking. Smith also argues that the concept behind shop classes--finding out how things work through designing, testing and building--is at the heart of what stimulates the minds of young engineers-to-be, spurring these students to become engineers for life.

According to Smith, hands-on work captivates the students and holds their attention in a way that book learning cannot duplicate. So for Smith, who sits on the Massachusetts Board of Education's Technology and Engineering Advisory Board, the question became: faced with cuts in technology education programs, how do you still give kids that vital hands-on experience? In part, the answer is virtual shop classes. Smith realized that, if he could not use traditional hands-on methodology, he could use a technological equivalent--3D computer-aided design.

A Source of Support

For help, Smith turned to the Design and Technology in Schools Program sponsored by PTC, a Needham, Massachusetts-based software company that makes computer-aided design (CAD) technology. During a free two-day teacher-training program sponsored by PTC, Smith learned how to use a 3D design program called Pro/DESKTOP and received instruction on how to integrate Pro/DESKTOP into his school's curriculum. Using 3D computer-aided design software programs like PTC's Pro/DESKTOP, students can use the computer to make a 3D representation of any physical object.

At the end of the training session, PTC gave Smith free unlimited seat licenses to its 3D computer-aided design software package, Pro/DESKTOP (worth about $200,000 to Newburyport High School), course materials and, according to Smith, all of the help and support that he needed to introduce Pro/DESKTOP into the classroom.

Smith was so excited by the program that he asked the school's physics teacher, Ken Cole, to take the teacher-training program as well. For the past few years, Cole has been teaching a physics session where his students designed and built their own catapults. In physics class, students learned about the theory behind launch angles, mass, force and acceleration, and they put their theories into practice, manufacturing catapults from scrap wood, duct tape and other odds and ends.

Armed with Pro/DESKTOP, Smith and Cole created a blended academic program where the students would learn the theories behind catapult design in Cole's physics class and create 3D models of their catapults using Pro/DESKTOP in Smith's robotics class, where they would also build the completed models.

"Sometimes there is no substitute for hands on learning," said Newburyport Superintendent Mary Murray. "The robotics class does an excellent job in bridging the gap between theoretical physics and the actual application of those concepts. The keystone in the bridge is Pro/DESKSTOP. By designing the robotics projects in 3D, the students can produce and see a visual representation of the machines that they are about to build."

For ideas on how to build their catapults, Smith and Cole had the students begin by doing research on the Internet. Simultaneously, Cole taught the students the physics concepts behind the catapults. With the groundwork for good catapult design firmly in place, Smith had the students use Pro/DESKTOP to fashion 3D models of their designs.

"Previously, shop classes were designed so that kids could help out around the house," says Smith. "In this program, we use 3D computer-aided design classes to teach students advanced math and physics concepts, like simple machines, mechanical advantage, related mathematics and best of all, problem solving."

Last year, the catapults were assembled using Lego's plastic rods, epoxy and Plexiglas, milled by the students. This year, the base for the catapults was built with microprocessors from stampsinclass.com and materials machined with CNC milling equipment. In December, the high school received a new CNC milling machine, donated in part by a Newburyport Education Business Coalition. Smith thinks the machine will make the milling and assembly process even easier, because the new machine can electronically enter the student's 3D design files into the milling machine computer, and based on this data, the machine can cut out complex curves necessary to manufacture the catapult's components. As Cole points out, anyone can build a catapult, but making it perform in a specific way is a lot more difficult.

In addition to learning basic design and engineering skills, Smith says that the catapult program teaches the students team-building skills. "With this project, the students, who are working in groups of four, have to interact with each other," Smith explains. "They learn how to work as a team to get the job done."

Students can also team up on other projects. The robotics course at Newburyport High School is now a one-semester course, but if students want to continue with learning about the subject, Smith gives them a project to do. Currently he has a student who is working on converting Pro/DESKTOP files for use in the milling machine. She is working with another student who is interested in taking robotics.

Smith notes that he has had a lot of girls in his previous classes-robotics is one area of technology that does tend to draw in more female students. But, he says, "We are always campaigning to get more girls in class." He apparently has offered plenty of inspiration to at least one young woman, because his own daughter is now in engineering school.

Launching Into the Future

Smith's robotics engineering program is still very young, but it is growing quite well. Last year, the program had 20 students; this year enrollment has tripled and he is looking for ways to add to the curriculum.

"One of our goals is that, as the program matures, we would like to bring the art teacher in more for the visual aspects," notes Smith. Therefore, next year, Smith and Cole plan to work with the Newburyport High School art teacher, Michelle Walker, to help the students learn how to incorporate visually appealing elements into the catapult's design.

In freshmen physics classes, students develop a water wheel project. Using Dixie cups. Styrofoam plates, duct tape and a dowel, the challenge is to construct a water wheel to lift the greatest mass, with a lab developed around the project that involves doing energy calculations. Cole says that honors-level students are learning Pro/DESKTOP to bring the project to the level of being done by computer.

Smith and Cole are still looking at more ways to benefit their students through their cooperative teaching. "We're right at the beginning of this," says Cole. "As a result of changes in our Science and Engineering Technology program, we've begun to offering a freshmen introduction to physics first, then slowly institute chemistry in sophomore year and biology in junior year. Then we can come back to physics and other electives in senior year."

Support for the program has come from many sources, Smith notes-from the school itself as well as the Newburyport Education and Business Coalition, whose board is composed of teachers, school department administrators and local business people. He attributes much of the credit to a supportive school system administration and the training he received from PTC.

"I can't say enough about how PTC has supported our program every inch of the way," says Smith. "It's a real, genuine outreach from the business community to the education community."

By continuing their own training, by connecting academics with career and technical education, and by finding solid sources of support for their programs, the teachers at Newburyport High School have found a way to catapult their students into success.