Back to Index

Project Excerpts & Commentary: ElectroHawk 1

The Story Behind the ElectroHawk 1 Project

Students were asked to devise a project that would develop their skills in gathering and using information, communication, and problem solving, and help them to become self-directed learners. They had wide latitude in choosing the focus for their projects. This student decided to design and build an electric car for entry in a local competition.

The students were expected to develop a proposal for their project, maintain a journal of the work they did, make a presentation of their finished work to an audience made up of people from the school and the community, and write a reflection on what they learned through the project. The students were also expected to find a mentor with expertise appropriate to their project focus to assist them through the process. The project was expected to take up some time in school but to also involve extensive work outside school time. A teacher took on the role of advising the students throughout the process of developing their proposals and planning their presentations.

This student formed a team of students to work on the project. They worked intensively on the project over a period of two months under deadlines established by the dates for the three rounds of racing competition.

The written work produced as part of Applied Learning projects commonly contains some errors. Documentation of these projects includes notes, journal entries and plans that students produced as working documents for their personal use. These kinds of documents were not prepared with the expectation of eventual publication and they have not been revised for inclusion in this book.

It is expected that finished work produced as part of an Applied Learning project will contain virtually error free writing.

This project illustrates a standard-setting performance for the following parts of the standards:
a Problem Solving: Design a product, service, or system.
a Information: Gather information.
e Information: Create, edit, and analyze a spreadsheet.
a Learning and Self-management: Learn from models.
b Learning and Self-management: Review own progress and adjust priorities as needed.
c Learning and Self-management: Evaluate own performance.
a Working With Others: Participate in the establishment and operation of self-directed work teams.

 

 

What the work shows
a Problem Solving: The student designs and creates a product, service, or system to meet an identified need; that is, the student:

• develops a design proposal that:
  – shows how the ideas for the design were developed;
  – reflects awareness of similar work done by others and of relevant design standards and regulations;
  – justifies the choices made in finalizing the design with reference, for example, to functional, aesthetic, social, economic, and environmental considerations;
  – establishes criteria for evaluating the product, service, or system;
  – uses appropriate conventions to represent the design;
• plans and implements the steps needed to create the product, service, or system;
• makes adjustments as needed to conform with specified standards or regulations regarding quality or safety;
• evaluates the product, service, or system in terms of the criteria established in the design proposal, and with reference to:
  – information gathered from sources such as impact studies, product testing, or market research;
  – comparisons with similar work done by others.

 




The proposal explains the genesis of the project: the P.U.D. (Public Utilities Department) provided the school with an electric motor, a speed control, and two batteries as the basis for designing and building an electric or solar-electric vehicle for entry in a competition with other schools in the local area.

The proposal records the plan the student envisaged early in the process. This plan is reflected in the timeline. The journal provides insight into the reality of the design process, especially the ways in which the students responded to problems they encountered as the design took shape.

The students began by building a wooden mock up for the vehicle (not shown).

The proposal provides a record of some of the design issues that the student envisaged would require resolution. These are reflected in the “Time Line.” The proposal also established criteria for evaluating the design: a solid, well built, highly efficient electric vehicle.

Apart from reference to the mock up (which is one of the ways of presenting a design for a product of this sort), there is no reference to the presentation of design plans.

The proposal notes some of the skills the student identified that he would need to learn in order to complete the project.

The students devoted a lot of time and energy to testing their design and to trying out strategies to improve its performance and efficiency. The strategies included analysis of records of performance.

a Learning and Self-management Tools and Techniques: The student learns from models; that is, the student:

• consults with and observes other students and adults at work and analyzes their roles to determine the critical demands, such as demands for knowledge and skills, judgment and decision making;
• identifies models for the results of project work, such as professionally produced publications, and analyzes their qualities;
• uses what he or she learns from models in planning and conducting project activities.

The proposal records the difficulties the students experienced in identifying a mentor, though they eventually succeeded in finding a person who had taken part in a similar project.

The team also made extensive use of the assistance of teachers with knowledge and expertise in areas such as welding. The student’s recognition of the importance of these models to the eventual result is evident throughout his journal.

a Tools and Techniques for Working With Others: The student participates in the establishment and operation of self-directed work teams; that is, the student:

• defines roles and shares responsibilities among team members;
• sets objectives and time frames for the work to be completed;
• establishes processes for group decision making;
• reviews progress and makes adjustments as required.

The student makes several references to the importance of teamwork in arriving at the goal of winning the competition. He notes also the connection between a strong team and the quality of the vehicle, and the connection between quality and safety.

The proposal also establishes the outcomes for the work to be completed.

a Problem Solving: The student designs and creates a product, service, or system to meet an identified need; that is, the student:

• develops a design proposal that:
  – shows how the ideas for the design were developed;
  – reflects awareness of similar work done by others and of relevant design standards and regulations;
  – justifies the choices made in finalizing the design with reference, for example, to functional, aesthetic, social, economic, and environmental considerations;
  – establishes criteria for evaluating the product, service, or system;
  – uses appropriate conventions to represent the design;
• plans and implements the steps needed to create the product, service, or system;
• makes adjustments as needed to conform with specified standards or regulations regarding quality or safety;
• evaluates the product, service, or system in terms of the criteria established in the design proposal, and with reference to:
  – information gathered from sources such as impact studies, product testing, or market research;
  – comparisons with similar work done by others.

The timeline records the planned steps for turning the design into a reality while the journal entries record the ways in which those steps were achieved in practice and the modifications to the process the students made along the way.

b Learning and Self-management Tools and Techniques: The student reviews his or her own progress in completing work activities and adjusts priorities as needed to meet deadlines; that is, the student:

• develops and maintains work schedules that reflect consideration of priorities;
• manages time;
• monitors progress towards meeting deadlines and adjusts priorities as necessary.

The work schedule was established in the timeline.

a Tools and Techniques for Working With Others:
The student participates in the establishment and operation of self-directed work teams; that is, the student:

• defines roles and shares responsibilities among team members;
• sets objectives and time frames for the work to be completed;
• establishes processes for group decision making;
• reviews progress and makes adjustments as required.

The proposal and timeline establish the objectives and time frame and the journal provides evidence that the team reviewed their progress and made adjustments as required.

 


a Problem Solving: The student designs and creates a product, service, or system to meet an identified need; that is, the student:

• develops a design proposal that:
  – shows how the ideas for the design were developed;
  – reflects awareness of similar work done by others and of relevant design standards and regulations;
  – justifies the choices made in finalizing the design with reference, for example, to functional, aesthetic, social, economic, and environmental considerations;
  – establishes criteria for evaluating the product, service, or system;
  – uses appropriate conventions to represent the design;
• plans and implements the steps needed to create the product, service, or system;
• makes adjustments as needed to conform with specified standards or regulations regarding quality or safety;
• evaluates the product, service, or system in terms of the criteria established in the design proposal, and with reference to:
  – information gathered from sources such as impact studies, product testing, or market research;
  – comparisons with similar work done by others.

The journal records some of the problems the students encountered and the strategies they adopted to solve them.

The design solutions reached during the course of construction of the vehicle are justified in terms of functional considerations.

The students were very aware of comparisons with other vehicles built for the competition. Even the use of “XXX” in the journal indicates an awareness that other electric car developers could gain advantages from the information the students gathered in their tests.

The journal was produced for the purposes of record keeping and reflection. It was not revised for publication.
The proposal and journal contain several references that demonstrate attention to relevant regulations and to safety-related considerations.

b Learning and Self-management Tools and Techniques: The student reviews his or her own progress in completing work activities and adjusts priorities as needed to meet deadlines; that is, the student:

• develops and maintains work schedules that reflect consideration of priorities;
• manages time;
• monitors progress towards meeting deadlines and adjusts priorities as necessary.

The journal records several instances in which the students found it necessary to adjust their priorities in order to deal with unforeseen problems and to meet deadlines.

a Tools and Techniques for Working With Others:
The student participates in the establishment and operation of self-directed work teams; that is, the student:

• defines roles and shares responsibilities among team members;
• sets objectives and time frames for the work to be completed;
• establishes processes for group decision making;
• reviews progress and makes adjustments as required.

It is clear from the journal entries that the work was a team effort, though there are few references to the definition of roles and responsibilities or of the processes the team established for decision making. The journal also makes it clear that the students took responsibility for the project despite the close involvement and assistance of their advisors.

c Learning and Self-management Tools and Techniques: The student evaluates his or her performance; that is, the student:

• establishes expectations for his or her own achievement;
• critiques his or her work in light of the established expectations;
• seeks and responds to advice and criticism from others.

The proposal and journal reflect the student’s expectations for his own achievement. The journal also records the student’s analysis of his work in light of those expectations. The entries focus on the efforts he and his fellow team members made to reach a satisfactory result, rather than a detailed analysis of the student’s own performance. There is also evidence of seeking and responding to advice, especially from the teachers who provided assistance to the team.

The student’s recognition of his accomplishment is evident throughout the written work, as is his pride which comes through in a humble voice.

a Information Tools and Techniques: The student gathers information to assist in completing project work; that is, the student:

• identifies potential sources of information to assist in completing the project;
• uses appropriate techniques to collect the information, e.g., considers sampling issues in conducting a survey;
• interprets and analyzes the information;
• evaluates the information in terms of completeness, relevance, and validity;
• shows evidence of research in the completed project.

The student collected data on various aspects of the performance of the electric car on test laps and produced graphs of the data as a tool to assist in its interpretation. He discusses the value of this research in completing the project in his journal.

e Information Tools and Techniques: The student creates, edits, and analyzes a spreadsheet of information that displays data in tabular, numeric format and includes multiple graphs; that is, the student:

• creates a spreadsheet that displays the use of formulas and functions;
• uses features of the software to sort, arrange, display, and extract data for specific purposes;
• uses features of the software to create multiple spreadsheets and to synthesize the spreadsheets into a single presentation.

The student used a spreadsheet program to assist in the analysis of the data he collected on the performance of the electric car.

Back to Index