spectrometer_minutes_9-26

1:30 PT

Scott, Nicholas, Steve, Bernhard, Lisa

Elisabeth phones in at 2:00 PT.

Secretary: Nicholas

1:30 PT: Updates

Access to printing and copying in Maui? Scott: yes. Depending on restrictions Mark might have, we could use IfA Maui or Kinko's near MCC if necessary.

Whiteboard in classroom?

Bernhard can come with copies of his documents.

Steve and Scott to design Questionnaire for end of Day 2.

Room number at MCC. . . Steve will look up. Elisabeth: meet in multi-purpose room, 8:30 on Monday.

1:34 PT: Prep Checklist

Materials We Bring to Maui

Scott: keep copies of Wiki material on our own PCs in case atwiki crashes.

Elisabeth has collected 50 CD's and DVD's. That should be enough.

Everyone can bring boxes if they fit in carry-on luggage. We can collect some in Maui if we need to.

Roles

See New Roles below. Otherwise, OK as outlined. Scott can fill in "if shit hits the fan."

Grouping

Each facilitator does manage 1 group for each challenge. Steve can help out if a primary facilitator wants to work with a different group.

Materials and Investigations

Materials for starters: only a few selected options for starters. Can release full selection of materials during Investigations.

Additional materials for investigations: can't think of any we need at this point

Back pocket materials: multi-object spectrograph? Photograph spectrum? Use digital photometers to move toward diagramming the spectrum? Beam splitting?

Should have already done an activity on pinhole cameras . . . we could maybe tie in to a multi-object bonus challenge.

At least one shopping trip is planned for other supplies. We could schedule another

Timing and Schedules

Steve will print out schedules we can edit in Maui.

Milestones: Day 2, success = met challenge. What are intermediate milestones, and exit points? Favorable comparison of group-designed spectrometer performance and Day 1 starter performance is an indication of progress. This can be specified/quantified.

Scott: if they can articulate what they would still do to reach the goal (even if they haven't yet), that is a conceptual success.

Absolute wavelength calibration: starting point is to design a spectrometer that does a good job of spreading out lines and allowing visual comparisons of different gases.

We should be recording milestones as we facilitate on Day 2. Scott advises directed tools such as spectrometer diagrams to help.

Facilitator check-in times: Steve suggests the halfway point of each Investigation stage. Steve and/or Scott will find us and check in.

Practicing and Planning

Should practice both starters and Design Challenges on Monday.

Thinking tools might be available as "back-pocket" resources for certain groups.

Need to be able to handle both students who are very experienced with inquiry and/or optics and students who have very little experience.

Bernhard plans to give a very basic introduction. Will err toward boring advanced students, before going over the head of less-experienced students.

We could consider the relative difficulty of our three design challenges. Nicholas and Lisa suspect that the calibration challenge will be most difficult, especially for less experienced students. But we should not be heavy-handed about steering students to appropriate challenges for their abilities, if we choose to do so at all.

Presentations: our current schedule seems rather short on time for presentations. If there is not time to integrate groups' results into the Synthesis, we should bring out good examples in the group discussions led by each Primary Facilitator.

What to Say

Everyone notes their own responsibility. Make an outline or notes of what you will say. Scott and others have past experience for this.

Documentation and Wrap-Up

All can bring cameras. Steve will. Scott and Elisabeth will take photos.

Steve: We are all responsible to productively employ John, Mark, and Elisabeth if there are things we would like them to help with.

Debrief: Thursday afternoon lunch.

Activity Context

No more classes before ours. "What's done is done."

Future exam questions: low priority

2:08 PT: Packing Materials

MCC is on the dry side of Maui.

Beach trip might be possible.

2:09 PT: Activity Timeline

Day 1, 9:00 to 9:35

OK as scheduled.

Day 1 Starters and Questions

Steve will direct students from station to station. Other facilitators stay put.

Students should be given nametags at beginning of activities. They should write their starter group number on the tag. We will randomly assign starter groups.

Expected questions from starters: we will need to direct them toward engineering questions without putting down physics questions.

"Remind them about design challenges" = remind them that there ARE design challenges. Design challenges should be described briefly in NM's Introduction segment.

Question review: will do as whole class

Day 1 Investigation and Homework

Facilitation goal for Day 1 Investigation: get them to a level of performance so they can meet the Day 2 design challenge.

Bernhard has implemented a version of Scott's suggestions for homework.

Bernhard and Nicholas should iterate to get language in homework assignment to match language in design challenge prompts.

Bernhard wants to leave open the expectations for writing vs diagrams on homework.

Day 2

Scott's suggestion for homework discussion is motivated to save time and to frame discussions to be based on planning ahead rather than reviewing the past. This also gives Steve a chance to make decisions about how to assign sub-groups within a design challenges.

Consensus: we will undertake Scott's amendment to the schedule.

Investigation: At 10:30 Steve will announce an optional break for the groups.

Presentation: small groups will get to see all design challenges. Not enough time for whole class.

New Roles

Homework review will now be done by all primary facilitators (1 per design challenge).

Lisa will now do the Question Review (Day 1, 10:40).

Nicholas will do Synthesis at the end of Day 2.

2:25 PT: Final Concerns

We should all either use the word "spectrometer" or "spectrograph." Or we should note in an intro presentation that both words mean essentially the same thing. Steve thinks that spectrographs take images and spectrometers measure wavelengths.

Where will we be on Sunday afternoon, vs. Monday?

What is "success" for students on Day 1? Homework will help evaluate this. We hope that they will be able to explain how individual elements of the spectrometer work, and how changing them might influence a design.

On Day 1 we can plan to facilitate either toward mastering a single element, or learning about how the elements work together to make a spectrograph, depending on which direction students appear to be headed.

We note in the timeline where we indicate to students that they will have a homework assignment. A poster outlining the assignment will be useful.

During break: we can add questions that we wish had been asked, but students did not.

Task List

Bernhard and Nicholas: get agreement between HW and challenge prompts

Everyone: pack for Maui and include boxes if possible

Everyone: save electronic copies of Wiki materials

Additional items?

These notes were edited for clarity before posting.