Applying the National Aeronautics and Spsace Administration's Digital Learning Network (DLN) to North Carolina's third grade mathematics standards: Traveling to the Moon.
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Darnell Johnson
[Team Website]
Abstract:
The primary focus of this research was to develop a new NASA Digital Learning Network module that was mathematically based and tied to NASA concepts/missions. This world of interactive learning with NASA’s Digital Learning Network (DLN) is available to teachers and students across the country to learn more about our home planet. DLN Coordinators conduct modules to students across the country at various times convenient to schools throughout the year. Objectives of this module were to apply the North Carolina’s Third Grade Mathematics Standards of ratio/proportions, scaling, area, and volume to NASA’s space vehicle transport systems that will return to the moon. The module educated students in the thir on how America will send a new generation of explorers to the moon aboard NASA’s Orion crew exploration vehicle. Participants in this newly-developed DLN event aided NASA in calculating the surface areas, obtain measurements of models, and used proportions to discover how/why NASA scientists have constructed the Orion, Ares 1, and Ares V vehicles. The students also used age-appropriate mathematical calculations to fully understand related processes.
Traveling Back to the Moon with NASA’s Digital Learning Network
Mentor: Caryn Long, DLN Assistant Manager
NASA Langley Research Center Office of Education
Abstract:
The project that I was assigned for the summer required development of a new NASA Digital Learning Network module that was mathematically based and tied to NASA concepts/missions. This world of interactive learning with NASA’s DLN is free, available to teachers and students across the country to learn more about our home planet. Digital Learning Network (DLN) Coordinators conduct modules to students across the country at various times convenient to schools throughout the year.
In order to understand the communication medium required to create a module and educate students, I trained with LaRC’s DLN Coordinator and Assistant Manager to effectively present the module, Magnificent Sun, to several schools across the country using distance learning equipment housed at NASA LaRC and the school where the module was presented. The conduction of module presentations on a variety of K-12 student levels allowed me to practice/develop instructional and presentational skills through distance learning. Upon completion of the module presentation phase of my internship, inservice was conducted by DLN Coordinators at Kennedy Space Center and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on how to develop a module.
The Effect of Math Sprint Competition in Student Achievement on SOL MathematicsTests at Camelot Elementary School
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Darnell Johnson
[Team Website]
Abstract:
Given Virginia’s Standards of Learning (SOL) (1995) mandates, Virginia’s elementary teachers and school leaders utilized research for teaching methods that encouraged gains on the end of course mathematics tests. The relationship between teacher motivation methods and student achievement on Virginia’s End of Course SOL Test for elementary deserves investigation. Virginia’s elementary students in grades three, four and five must maintain an annual pass rate to meet Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) as recommended by the national “No Child Left Behind Act” of 2001. Camelot Elementary School is a Title I school housing high concentrations of minority students who normally achieve lower test score gains than students in other schools. Camelot has a student population receiving at least seventy percent free and reduced lunch nested in a low middle class neighborhood in Chesapeake, Virginia.
This research was based on school effectiveness by developing and testing hypotheses about the specific relationships between student competition and state wide testing results in elementary mathematics in grades three and five at Camelot Elementary School in Chesapeake, Virginia. The study compiled data from the “Math Sprint Competition”, a series of student group related reviews of state released test items in a math test relay format. Research focused on methods for motivating an experimental group of students motivated by the use of a math sprint competition from 2005 to 2007 versus a control group of elementary students in mathematics for grades three and five from 2002 to 2004. Student learning activities were compared from teaching methods that included: direct instruction, problem-based learning, technology aided instruction, cooperative learning, manipulative, models, and multiple representations, communication, and study skills.
A group of twenty-four elementary teachers from Camelot Elementary School participated in this research to ascertain how frequently they used research-based teaching methods and determined the influence of teaching methods on their students’ achievement. A multiple regression analysis was used to show results from a 40-item state wide test for each grade level. Individual Pearson Product Moment Correlations were conducted to determine which variables possess strong and statistically significant relationships. This analysis determined if gains on the end of the year SOL scores were a result of an impact of the series of math sprint competitions used as motivators before each benchmark assessment leading to the SOL tests in 3rd and 5th grade mathematics.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Mission Planning to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland
Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets (CReSIS), University of Kansas
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Shah Keshmiri
Graduate Student Mentor: Rylan Jager
Abstract:
The Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets (CReSIS) is developing an Uncrewed Aerial Vehicle (UAV) for application as a sensor platform in Polar Regions. Existing certification and flight regulations in Greenland do not adequately address the aircraft’s larger size, nor have vehicles of this type been previously operated in the area. This paper will address some of the preliminary efforts undertaken to coordinate and fly the Meridian UAV in Greenland, beginning in 2008.
Developing Standards and Practices for Archiving Multimedia Material:
Faculty Mentor: Jeff Wood
[Team Website]
Abstract:
The Center for Excellence in Remhttp://nia.ecsu.edu/ur/0607/teams/mmt/index.htmlote Sensing Education and Research (CERSER) at Elizabeth City State University is an umbrella for several funded projects. These projects include: The Northeastern Chapter of the IEEE-GRSS Society, The Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets (CReSIS), NOAA's Educational Partnership Program at ECSU, The Undergraduate Research Experience in Ocean and Marine Science Program (URE OMS), as well as the Undergraduate Research Experience Program supporting undergraduate research at ECSU. These programs entail numerous special events that generate both video and photographic images. Reports and other documentation are also created to record the success and progress of each program.
A standard method of digitizing images, movies, and documents and documenting the attributes of these digitized files was developed during this project. Standard procedures utilizing the equipment currently in place were developed, tested, and refined in order to convert VHS formatted tapes and developed photographs into digital files. Software such as CapWiz and Hewlett-Packard flatbed scanning software were used to complete this process. These files were then annotated in a Microsoft Access database utilizing the Dublin Core Element Set as a standard. A combination of Microsoft Access and Active Server pages was then utilized to provide access to the digitized images and the attached metadata via the web.
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