‘Cool Software’ has one goal; to get students excited about and interested in engineering technology. The initiative had been proposed as an industry sponsored voluntary outreach project designed to excite and involve Primary and Second Level students in maths and programming activities.
1.0 Objectives
‘Cool Software’ volunteers are holding a workshop over three days to design two practical outreach programmes; one addressing 4th/5th class Primary students, and one addressing year 2 students at Second level. The programme introduces students to technology-centred problem solving and teamwork exercises using Lego Mindstorms. The end goal is simply to get students at all levels excited about and interested in engineering technology.
The objective of the workshop is to design a programme of activities and supporting material for delivery by volunteer engineers and programmers during school term. Each programme will be delivered in a small number of sessions in school classrooms but outside of normal school hours. The programmes will apply math concepts, design thinking, involve teamwork, learning-through-doing, and have a competitive element.
1.1 Notes
Consider student awareness of concepts like rotation angles, degrees, distance, and calibrating ideal versus actual movement, dead reckoning, feedback, and errors. Thinking about the relationships between hardware and software, the work of engineering and programming, the use of Maths in design.
1.2 Background
In the race for CAO points students in Ireland have increasingly abandoned higher maths and other science-based subjects and are opting for less daunting subjects to achieve higher points and entry into University degree programmes. The education challenge has been compounded the perception that Science subjects are just too hard and this in turn increases the pressure to adopt intensive grind style teaching methods and studying for the examination rather than the subject area. Various conclusions have been drawn as to why this situation holds; an uninteresting and overcrowded curriculum, a culture of ‘rote’ learning. The teacher’s dilemma can be characterised along the lines of ‘should I impart a passion for the subject – give them the freedom to use and apply the knowledge themselves, or should I simply drill them in what they need to know to pass the exam?’
At the Primary level there is evidence that significant proportion of teachers (28%) feel they are poorly prepared to teach Maths. This may contribute to follow-on problems at Second Level, with relatively high failure rates at Ordinary Level Leaving Certificate Maths (12% in 2008) and low enrolment numbers in Higher Level Leaving Certificate Maths (only 16% - 18% of the student population). The situation is blamed in turn for the drop off in numbers of Sciences graduates and this is causing concern in industry, support agencies and the higher education sector. These trends have prompted Ireland’s professional bodies for mathematics, engineering, computing and software engineering to highlight the risks facing the Irish economy if the number of computing, maths and science graduates falls to levels which fail to satisfy the workforce demands of the high-tech sector.
An education task force was recently established to investigate and suggest ways of addressing these problems. The report of the ‘Task Force on Education of Mathematics and Science at Second Level’ suggests a number of actions for primary and secondary education that may address these issues. Remedies have been suggested ranging over: giving Math and Science subjects greater weight in CAO calculations; addressing skills gaps in teachers; delivering special outreach programmes to primary and secondary schools; raising awareness and creating excitement about Science and Engineering; making the curriculum more engaging and relevant; and in particular, promoting the greater use of technology “to contextualise the teaching of Mathematics and Science at Primary and Second Level.” (Engineers Ireland, 2010)
References:
Engineers Ireland (2010) Report of Task Force on Education of Mathematics and Science at Second Level. Engineers Ireland. (link)
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