This study presents a rollercoaster activity including virtual reality and following the six-steps engineering design process. In the study, a real-life problem involving a rollercoaster accident was given to 12 pre-service science teachers first. The participants were then asked to imagine, plan, create, and test a rollercoaster without an…

In this paper we deal with a geometric machine that has gone somewhat unnoticed in mathematics education: the Perfect Compass. It allows conics to be drawn using a special two aperture compass, based on Apollonius' conic sections. Proposed in the 10th century, it seems that it was never built in medieval times--at least no archaeological remains…

In this article, the authors explain how they leveraged the popularity of the "Star Wars" franchise to introduce a task steeped in popular culture as a fun way to engage their students in investigating complex mathematics that have real-life connections to careers in toy design and engineering design in general. The authors share various…

Engineering education has slowly been making its way into schools with the aim of promoting engineering literacy, which is central to learning and working in a technology-oriented society. Educators and policy makers advocate the need for developing students' understanding of the nature of engineering (NOE); yet, there is an ongoing debate on the…

Gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) are textbook model systems to introduce "Nanomaterials" and "Nanotechnology" to students and laypersons. AuNPs are also suitable materials to raise awareness about the "Green Chemistry" principles. The unique optical and catalytic properties of nanosized gold make it ideal to timely develop…

This article describes the NASA-Funded Space Grant Project BOREALIS: "Balloon Outreach, Research, Exploration, and Landscape Imaging System." BOREALIS conducts high-altitude balloon flights to the "edge of space" with flights typically reaching 100,000 feet and a current record flight in the summer of 2020 that reached 126,000…

Technical standards are important documents that academic libraries collect to support education and research, particularly for engineering and technology programs. However, standards documents present many unique discovery and access challenges that are confusing and cumbersome for users. To help alleviate these issues, Elsevier started indexing…

Since 2012, when triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) were first reported by Wang and co-workers, various applications have taken advantage of their ability to transform mechanical energy into electrical energy. TENG applications cover many fields, including electronics, physics, materials science, and engineering. The differences in the language…

The versatility required for employment continues to change with technological advancements. Some of the top listed skills needed for a career are positive attitude, communication, time management, critical-thinking, and problem-solving (Peart, 2019). How to teach each of these competencies may take different strategies and techniques. This…

In an ever-increasing technological society, teachers have now, more than ever, a vast offering of educational technologies made available for classroom use. However, the time necessary for vetting and developing rigorous lessons with the usage of such technologies can be overwhelming for a classroom teacher. Still, teachers need the opportunity…

The Wright brothers, Wilbur and Orville, are often depicted as lone geniuses, secretly assembling the first successful powered aircraft far from civilization at Kitty Hawk on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. There is a germ of truth in the popular story, but only a germ. The brothers succeeded while so many other experimenters failed not because…

STEM education is an easily identified area of innovation in the education field. The most significant innovation for our students' lives, however, is ensuring that these technology-based programs are providing opportunities for students to engage with the world in meaningful ways and to recognize how they can contribute to positive…

The value of doing projects as a vehicle for instruction has been integral to technology and engineering classes for decades. With the increased emphasis on STEM, project-based learning is becoming more popular with all teachers. Realistically, classrooms can be limited, however, in the tools, materials, and processes needed for project-based…

The COVID-19 pandemic has introduced challenges to delivering laboratory-based STEM curricula. This study evaluates students' learning experience in a synchronous team design activity within the laboratory component of an undergraduate Computer Engineering course during the pandemic. Using the EduPad digital platform, students collaborated in…

This three-day integrated 5E inquiry lesson that includes physics, engineering, and biology concepts, uses physical computing and photoplethysmography to learn about one's pulse. The main learning objective is to have students communicate how wave phenomena, like a pulse, can be analyzed using sensors, which is called physical computing. This…