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#PLTW Summit
What I love about this class is students take this class in their senior year of high school and it is a great capstone course for students to show what engineering skills they have developed and perfected over the last few years of school....Here's a link to our course website: https://sites.google.com/cv.k12.ca.us/cvhsporteredd4thyear/welcome-to-edd
The main focus in this capstone engineering class is utilizing the design process to solve a problem around our local community.Remember the steps:
- DEFINE the problem
- IDENTIFY constraints on your solution (e.g. time, money, materials) and criteria for success
- BRAINSTORM multiple solutions for the problem
- SELECT the most promising solution
- PROTOTYPE your solution
- TEST and evaluate your prototype
- ITERATE to improve your prototype
- COMMUNICATE and present your solution
What's this class about
What's this class about
The EDD course should be taken as a capstone course in the 12th grade because it applies the knowledge and skills from the Project Lead the Way® foundation courses in solving an identified technical problem.
Engineering Design and Development™ (EDD) project differs from a stereotypical science fair project in that the results of the experiment cannot be readily gained or "looked-up.” In addition to putting great care into the methodology of testing a hypothesis, a research project requires the student to suggest and justify a unique and original solution to a problem. As an example, choosing to find the rate at which bread becomes moldy under certain conditions may be both valuable and important information to the food industry, but experiments answering questions like this have already been performed and documented thousands of times.
A true research project would involve investigating a concern or problem in the food industry that attempts to add to the industry in a positive manner. Examples might include longer lasting preservatives, more efficient methods of processing or harvesting plants, or less expensive containers in which to package the food. The task of justifying and repeating the results of another researcher's work is an extremely valuable part in determining the validity of new information or verifying the effectiveness of a given product. However, with the possible exception of determining a more effective testing method, the act of repeating any research is not original work and only serves to validate rather than add information to a given field of interest.
Therefore, finding and justifying a "question" to answer, or problem to address, and carefully defining the solution to the question or problem is one of the biggest challenges of this course. Engineers or other professionals are not hired solely because they have the skills to solve problems, but more importantly because they can identify and justify problems that need solving.
Engineering Design and Development™ (EDD) project differs from a stereotypical science fair project in that the results of the experiment cannot be readily gained or "looked-up.” In addition to putting great care into the methodology of testing a hypothesis, a research project requires the student to suggest and justify a unique and original solution to a problem. As an example, choosing to find the rate at which bread becomes moldy under certain conditions may be both valuable and important information to the food industry, but experiments answering questions like this have already been performed and documented thousands of times.
A true research project would involve investigating a concern or problem in the food industry that attempts to add to the industry in a positive manner. Examples might include longer lasting preservatives, more efficient methods of processing or harvesting plants, or less expensive containers in which to package the food. The task of justifying and repeating the results of another researcher's work is an extremely valuable part in determining the validity of new information or verifying the effectiveness of a given product. However, with the possible exception of determining a more effective testing method, the act of repeating any research is not original work and only serves to validate rather than add information to a given field of interest.
Therefore, finding and justifying a "question" to answer, or problem to address, and carefully defining the solution to the question or problem is one of the biggest challenges of this course. Engineers or other professionals are not hired solely because they have the skills to solve problems, but more importantly because they can identify and justify problems that need solving.
All EDD projects use what is known in engineering as a gantt chart to keep track of the timeline for their project. At the end of the day, clients want to know if their project was on time and on budget. Below is an example of the timeline used for this class...
Click the link to see an overview of the course, assignments and standards assessed through the class.
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