http://www.smete.org Newest 10 learning objects added at SMETE.ORG http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=BACB0F75-2B01-4D13-B27F-7C37C61828AE Engineering Pathway's "Today in History" for July 27. "Today in History – July 27, 2010 – Plastic bottle catamaran named “Plastiki” completes epic pacific crossing. A crew of experts, scientists, and creatives, led by visionary explorer David de Rothschild, sailed over 12,000 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean from San Francisco to Sydney in a boat made out of plastic bottles and recycled waste products. The name “Plastiki” was inspired by Thor Heyerdal’s 1947 epic expedition the Kontiki. The purpose of this bold adventure was to draw attention to our carbon footprint with a focus on those ubiquitous PEP water bottles and the Pacific Garbage Patch. The catamaran design was a pioneering example of sustainable design. The team aims to captivate and inspire, as well as to motivate tomorrow’s environmental thinkers and doers to take positive action for the planet and be smart with waste. Ultimately, they hope to inspire people to rethink waste as a valuable resource. One person’s waste could be another person’s treasure.” Sat, 31 Jul 2010 17:32:07 GMT Alice Agogino http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=BACB0F75-2B01-4D13-B27F-7C37C61828AE Alice Agogino 2010-07-31T17:32:07Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=99A8F417-8DA6-4965-A495-F0A65151C630 BAMS (Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society) annual reports on the state of the climate, from 2005 to present. (pdf documents). Sat, 31 Jul 2010 17:14:36 GMT NOAA National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=99A8F417-8DA6-4965-A495-F0A65151C630 NOAA National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration 2010-07-31T17:14:36Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=8F2A9695-7D08-40C6-A073-3C0E903E6A6A "CHARTS showing the warming of the Earth normally look like spaghetti thrown across the page. This chart, adapted from a compendious “State of the climate” report published by America's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration this week, simplifies things by offering only decadal averages, and making clear the uncertainties by showing the 95% confidence ranges on those averages." Sat, 31 Jul 2010 17:07:15 GMT The Economist http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=8F2A9695-7D08-40C6-A073-3C0E903E6A6A The Economist 2010-07-31T17:07:15Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=526CF712-52DC-4CFF-A28C-DD98559F964C Blog by RealClimate by climate scientists. Excerpt: "Global warming is turning 35! Not only has the current spate of global warming been going on for about 35 years now, but also the term “global warming” will have its 35th anniversary next week. On 8 August 1975, Wally Broecker published his paper “Are we on the brink of a pronounced global warming?” in the journal Science. That appears to be the first use of the term “global warming” in the scientific literature (at least it’s the first of over 10,000 papers for this search term according to the ISI database of journal articles). In this paper, Broecker correctly predicted “that the present cooling trend will, within a decade or so, give way to a pronounced warming induced by carbon dioxide”, and that “by early in the next century [carbon dioxide] will have driven the mean planetary temperature beyond the limits experienced during the last 1000 years”. He predicted an overall 20th Century global warming of 0.8ºC due to CO2 and worried about the consequences for agriculture and sea level." Image caption: Global temperature up to June 2010 according to the NASA GISS data. Grey line is the 12-month running average, red dots are annual-mean values. The thick red line is a non-linear trend line. Broecker of course did not have these data available, not even up to 1975, since this global compilation was only put together in the late 1970s (Hansen et al. 1981). He had to rely on more limited meteorological data. Sat, 31 Jul 2010 16:31:35 GMT RealClimate http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=526CF712-52DC-4CFF-A28C-DD98559F964C RealClimate 2010-07-31T16:31:35Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=3DF65D14-9477-4F82-9E89-AD709FA4BADF The University of Alabama proposes a multi-tiered mentoring model (M3) that partners a diverse university campus with a large urban school system. The project will provide high-level instruction in computational thinking across three different age groups using a "Learn to Teach, Teach to Learn" approach. The participants will include: (1) middle and high school students from minority backgrounds, (2) their teachers, (3) minority and majority college students with secondary science education or computer science majors, (4) University educators from four interdisciplinary units (Computer Science, and the schools of Education, Engineering, and Medicine); and (5) a learning design firm dedicated to enhancing computing education through media and technology. The Specific Aims of M3 are: (1) to recruit a cadre of minority and women middle and high school students into the computing pipeline by presenting engaging mentored technology experiences, (2) to expose pre-service secondary education students to pedagogical and technical aspects of computing education, through interdisciplinary peer mentorship, (3) to extend computational expertise among high school teachers in predominantly minority schools to encourage them to actively learn and teach computer science courses in their schools, (4) to increase the retention of minority students in undergraduate computer science programs by providing them opportunities to create innovative tools for computing education, (5) to engage K-12 administrators and parents of participants through workshops that highlight the benefits of careers in computing and (6) to evaluate the effects of M3 on student and teacher performance in computing education, their aptitude and interest for this area of research and tracking of career choices among participants. Sat, 31 Jul 2010 16:26:30 GMT J. Michael Wyss http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=3DF65D14-9477-4F82-9E89-AD709FA4BADF J. Michael Wyss 2010-07-31T16:26:30Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=ECAEF3D1-87B9-4852-A513-BC66FC419E6F Mississippi State University (MSU) proposes a project to increase the number of students entering and graduating from degree programs in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, and Business Information Systems at four institutions of higher learning in the Mississippi. The project will have four major components: (1) A Leadership Experience in Computing program, focusing on the transition from community colleges into 4 year programs. It will provide full summer school scholarships to community college students, enabling them to take two college credit courses, one an iPhone/iPod Touch programming class, designed specifically to show that programming can be interesting and fun, and the other, a service-oriented class that shows how computing fits into a variety of career paths. (2) A Career Advisory Council that will engage local employers in order to get commitments to provide internships, interviews, and jobs for project graduates. (3) A recruiting campaign that will educate high school, community college, and undergraduate students on the wide range of career options in computing related fields. (4) The development of a community college-to-university articulation agreements. The project will leverage existing relationships - between the participating community colleges and Mississippi's secondary schools, and between MSU and existing employers - to develop a seamless pathway between Mississippi's system of fifteen community colleges and MSU. Sat, 31 Jul 2010 16:05:42 GMT Rodney Pearson http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=ECAEF3D1-87B9-4852-A513-BC66FC419E6F Rodney Pearson 2010-07-31T16:05:42Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=5663AEEB-1FAF-484C-8621-EE56EFA13943 Blog for BEAM - Berkeley Engineers and Mentors. This student-initiated group was created to provide students at low-income schools with engaging engineering activities that help promote interest in math, science and engineering. Sat, 31 Jul 2010 00:25:20 GMT BEAM - Berekely Engineers and Mentors http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=5663AEEB-1FAF-484C-8621-EE56EFA13943 BEAM - Berekely Engineers and Mentors 2010-07-31T00:25:20Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=13B12191-1FA7-44B9-928A-01E6D75E0975 Our lesson plans are categorized according to Grade Level and Engineering Field, and can be sorted accordingly. They were crafted by BEAM members and are available free of charge. Take a look! (All lesson plans are PDFs). Sat, 31 Jul 2010 00:18:05 GMT BEAM http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=13B12191-1FA7-44B9-928A-01E6D75E0975 BEAM 2010-07-31T00:18:05Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=ECE5C698-0897-4EF1-9C16-BCC36C8ED758 See how silkworms and spiders work their magic in this video. "Imagine a material that is tougher than Kelvar or steel, yet remarkably flexible. It's something you can easily find in your attic or a lingerie store. It's as instantly recognizable today as it was to our early ancestors, yet we still aren't sure exactly how it's made. The miracle thread in question is natural silk, the ubiquitous fibers made by spiders and silkworms, which has been used throughout history for items ranging from stockings and parachutes to surgical sutures. Today scientists and engineers are creating a number of useful materials based on silk research. But many researchers believe these applications may just be the start of a whole web of useful new products and devices, if only we had a better understanding of just how these small creatures spin their precious thread. In recent years, researchers have worked to gain a better understanding of what silk is and how it's made, with the goal of being able to consistently replicate and enhance its production synthetically. In the July 30 edition of the journal Science, two Tufts University researchers, Fiorenzo G. Omenetto and David L. Kaplan, review the state of silk research, the challenges that remain, and why synthetic silk production is so appealing." Sat, 31 Jul 2010 00:05:17 GMT David Wrght, NSF - National Science Foundation http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=ECE5C698-0897-4EF1-9C16-BCC36C8ED758 David Wrght, NSF - National Science Foundation 2010-07-31T00:05:17Z http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=19B0AD5D-39BD-47E5-B06D-43A81AE07C4B Berkeley Engineers and Mentors was created to provide students at low-income schools with engaging engineering activities that help promote interest in math, science and engineering. Several courses are available, along with lesson plans for K-12 outreach. Fri, 30 Jul 2010 23:19:18 GMT Lisa Pruitt http://www.smete.org/smete/public/learning_objects/summary/?lo=19B0AD5D-39BD-47E5-B06D-43A81AE07C4B Lisa Pruitt 2010-07-30T23:19:18Z