Physical Computing for Students and Teachers
Year 2 - 2007 Class Website / Past Project Documentation
The Physical Computing Pilot is a collaboration among DEI, The Institute for Schools of the Future, Lehman College (CUNY), and the School for Community Research and Learning. The Pilot Program was designed for students and teachers to explore how engaging in physical computing activities would add to the understanding of, primarily, mathematics and science, while including concepts involving art and technology.
What is Physical Computing?
Physical Computing explores how humans communicate through computers.
It uses the physical emission of various forms of energy—heat, light,
sound, motion etc) to control computer actions. Physical computing,
thereby, invents new forms of human-computer interaction and new interfaces
to information. Physical computing is a participatory medium. It is equally
relevant to the scientist who can “feel” molecules or see atoms light up as
he/she “walks” through a virtual reality environment, to the sculptor
who would like a participant to experience different sounds, images
or videos based on how/where that participant touched a sculpture, or a sociologist
who needs to count the number of pedestrians passing a street corner.
The physical computing realm encompasses all of the STEM objectives
(Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). Moreover, its’ integrative
underpinning provides a unique intersection of the sciences and the humanities.
Physical Computing 2004/ 2005
During the summer of 2004, Advanced Educational Systems offered a pilot “physical computing” class to a group of students and one teacher from a High School in the Bronx, as well as two teachers from the Salk School of Science in Manhattan. Our goal for the class was to introduce the concept of physical computing to a combined group of students and teachers in the hope that they would be able to integrate it into the process of learning or teaching science, math, art and technology.
The teachers were encouraged to think about ways they could integrate Physical Computing into their present subject matter (which, for most of the teachers involved, was science) in order to stimulate interest in alternative ways to teach traditional concepts, as well as increase the exposure of technology in high school curriculum. We also hoped that its emergence in the classroom would encourage students to pursue technology as a means of self-expression, as well as bring a new understanding to the formal curriculum, in hopes that there will be an early bridging of the conceptual gap between emerging technology and the long-established subject matter.
The class was structured to provide hands-on experience with basic electronics and circuit building with various sensors, programming and small-scale application development, using multimedia programs (namely, Flash MX 2004) to facilitate creative interactive response, as well as working with MakingThings, a prefabricated module developed for rapid-prototyping between the computer environment and the circuit, to connect the on-screen world with the “physical” world.
We continually documented the class so that we could analyze the design and structure of the course, and reflect on the effectiveness of the syllabus in regards to how well concepts were being grasped, and proficiency was being established.
The participants were able to deconstruct the elements that needed to be mastered in order to create the interactive environments and representations integral to the framework of physical computing. From the scope that the final projects were developed conceptually and physically, we felt like our aims were achieved, especially in regards to the participants’ ability to fathom their own capabilities, and apply them to the creation of amazing final projects.
DEI Instructors:
Gabriela Richard
Coordinator & Instructor, NYU Division of Educational Informatics
gabriela.richard@med.nyu.edu
Eric Fino
Instructional Staff Member, Interactive Telecommunications Program,
Tisch School of the Arts
whitegorilla@nyu.edu
Eric Forman
Instructor & Consultant, Interactive Telecommunications Program, Tisch
School of the Arts
eric@ericforman.com
Joel Murphy
Instructor & Consultant
joel@joelmurphy.net
Zohar Kfir
Media Designer, NYU Division of Educational Informatics
zk222@med.nyu.edu
Jason Kaufman
Instructor & Consultant, Interactive Telecommunications Program, Tisch
School of the Arts
jason@ta-da.com
Miro Kirov
3-D Designer, NYU Division of Educational Informatics
kirovm01@med.nyu.edu
Heather Delaney
Media Designer,NYU Division of Educational Informatics
heatherd10@gmail.com