Week Eight September 7 - 13, 2008

Week Eight September 7 - 13, 2008

The following is a summary of the activities that I have been engaged in during the week of September 6 - 13 as they relate to the work I am doing here at UMCE as part of my Fulbright Scholarship.

Meeting at US Embassy

On Wednesday, September 10, I attended a reception at the home of the US Ambassador, Paul E. Simons that was hosted by the Washington, DC think tank, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). This group is best known for its creating the interfaces that spawned the communication of the Internet, and lead to Tim Berners-Lee’s development of the World Wide Web. DARPA is the U.S. Department of Defense central research and development organization with the mission to conceive, develop, and demonstrate advanced technology that would lead to new military capabilities. I did make some contacts, as I did think that the work we are doing at UTEP, both in Engineering and Homeland Security, might be ripe for some type of collaboration in the future.

More on the visit form DARPA:

http://santiago.usembassy.gov/OpenNews/asp/pagDefault.asp?argInstanciaId=2&argNoticiaId=4105

Physics Project in El Mercurio

On Sunday, September 14 I was in the Education section of the Mercurio, the oldest newspaper in Santiago and was featured for my work in the local schools, along with Prof. Claudio Perez.

The article can be accessed online here:

http://www.mer.cl/modulos/catalogo/Paginas/2008/09/14/MERSTVS025AA1409.htm

Physics Instruction at Liceos

On Monday, September 8, I worked at the 2 local high schools implementing the physics project from la UMCE. The first school, Liceo Juan Antonio Ríos, has approximately 15 students in the project. The second school, Liceo Capitán de Corbete Pedro Gonzáles, has 2 sections of students, the first with approximately 30 students and the second with 35 students. I did another brief demonstration at each school, followed by data gathering for the physics experiments. We set up instrumentation with the student teams who gathered data with both traditional materials such as tape measurers and stopwatches as well with motion sensors. This was done in order to get data from the movement so that the student teams can construct data driven computer models.

Class Schedules at UMCE

This week, the classes were suspended for students, but professors and staff did have to attend and work on campus. There was also concern throughout the city for the 11 of September, which marks the date of the military coup of Pinochet in 1973. This day is marked often with conflict and demonstration throughout the city. This month also features the coming celebrations of national independence, that happen September 18 and 19 and is 2 days of national celebration.

Data Analysis of Student Attitudes in Science and Computers

I have continued to input my survey data from both the classes at UMCE and from the 2 liceos, and should have a solid set of preliminary data from which to draw my comparison studies. I am inputting everything in Excel at this time, as it is just pre-test data, but will be able to use SPSS to analyze the statistics once the post-tests are done. The goal is to have data pre and post in the areas of attitudes, efficacy, technology use and content information in physics for the students at UMCE and hopefully have the pre and post in the areas of attitudes and content information in physics for the students at the liceos. We have also worked on the data analysis for the content area pre-exams for the students here at la UMCE, and have established baseline scores for the groups.