STRATEGIES FOR DEVELOPING CUTTING-EDGE CURRICULUM …silver.neep.wisc.edu/~mandm/faculty_pages/crone/PDF/JME_curriculu… · STRATEGIES FOR DEVELOPING CUTTING-EDGE CURRICULUM

Journal of Materials Education Vol. 27 (3-6): 115 – 122 (2005)

STRATEGIES FOR DEVELOPING CUTTING-EDGE CURRICULUM AND OUTREACH MATERIALS A.B. Ellis 1,2, G.M. Zenner 3,4 and W.C. Crone 3,4

1 Division of Chemistry, National Science Foundation, 4201 Wilson Boulevard, Arlington, Virginia 22230; 2 Department of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1101 University Avenue, Madison, Wisconsin 53706-1396; 3 Department of Engineering Physics, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1500 Engineering Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706-1687; 4 Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1550 Engineering Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706-1608. ABSTRACT Incorporating cutting-edge science into classrooms and laboratories at many levels – middle school, high school, undergraduate, and graduate – is important for engaging students in science and engineering and maintaining their interest. Students are likely to feel closer to the research process, show more general interest in science and engineering, and learn more effectively when their instructional materials are up-to-date, based on current research, and relevant to their lives. This can be a challenging task, however. We provide examples of our efforts to develop cutting-edge curriculum and outreach materials around topics of nanoscale science and engineering and identify general strategies that we have found useful for integrating research and education. Collaboration, student involvement, an iterative development process, and use of new and challenging concepts have proven fruitful for bringing nanoscale science and engineering concepts into a variety of classroom and laboratory environments. Keywords: nanotechnology; instructional materials development; societal implications of nanotechnology INTRODUCTION Instructors in science classrooms at many levels – middle school, high school, undergraduate, and graduate – often rely on texts, activities and laboratory experiments that have existed for decades. While this approach certainly provides exposure to a field, it may not stimulate a desire in

students for further study if it fails to communicate the excitement of discovery and the relevance of science. Based on our experience 1 and that of others 2, 3, we have found that instructional materials that relate to current research and have relevance to students’ lives help to improve student attitude about and interest in science and engineering. To address these

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issues, the National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW) has developed curriculum and outreach materials based on cutting-edge research in nanoscale science and engineering. Our experience has shown that this approach engages students and helps to maintain their interest in science and engineering. The process of translating current research into instructional materials appropriate for a specific group of students can be challenging. A first-year graduate student, let alone a middle-school student, can not be expected to possess the requisite knowledge needed to understand advanced research in a university or industrial setting. Thus, instructional materials need to be prepared in a developmentally-appropriate, audience-focused manner, and we have identified several strategies that can be effective during this process: • Collaboration Interdisciplinary work takes

advantage of the expertise and knowledge of a diverse group of people. Involving colleagues from other disciplines and institutions – including industry, national laboratories, technical schools, and middle and high schools – ensures that the materials developed serve the target audience effectively. Beyond the technical content, collaboration is required between researchers and educators familiar with the level of students at which the materials are targeted. We found nanoscale science and engineering well-suited to collaborative work, as it is intrinsically interdisciplinary, drawing upon ideas from across traditional science and engineering fields.

• Graduate and undergraduate student involvement Students involved as researchers and interns with the development of curriculum and outreach materials gain professional development from the experience, which often influences their career trajectories.

• Iterative development process Assessment should be integrated throughout the

development process (formative) and conducted after the project’s completion (summative). It usually requires a significant amount of time, often several years, to complete a new product, be it a laboratory experiment or a kit. This iterative development process includes testing and revising at all stages of development. In addition to creating an improved product, an additional positive outcome of frequent testing with different groups is the creation of a community that is eager to use and publicize the final product.

• New and challenging concepts To engage students with cutting-edge research, it is important to integrate new and challenging concepts into the materials being developed. This also has the effect of making the materials current and connected to innovative new products that may be relevant to students’ lives.

The following three case studies provide examples of our how we have used these four strategies to incorporate nanoscale science and engineering into middle-school, high-school, and undergraduate classrooms and laboratories. CASE STUDIES Introducing societal aspects of nanotechnology into the middle-school classroom The UW MRSEC’s NSF-funded Internships in Public Science Education (IPSE) program trains undergraduate and graduate student interns to bring nanotechnology to the public in a variety of ways 4. During the IPSE program’s first three years, multi-disciplinary teams of interns developed activities about nanotechnology appropriate for the middle-school classroom. Each two-person team created an activity about either an application of nanotechnology or the societal implications of nanotechnology. Megan Anderson, a UW graduate student, created an activity that introduces the basic concepts of nanotechnology to middle-school students and encourages them to think critically about the

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integration of nanotechnology (and technology more broadly) into society. Anderson’s 45-minute “NanoCommunities” classroom activity asks students to explore how different communities use technologies differently and illustrates the connections between technology and society. After a brief introduction to nanotechnology and community usages of current and past technology, students design an application of a nanotechnology for a specific community. The students are divided into small teams, each of which represents a different community, such as a retirement community, a prison, a dairy farm, a small fishing village, or an industrial city. Each team invents possible applications for their community of “nano-rope,” an extremely strong, but lightweight thread made out of nanofibers and modeled after spider silk. The teams each create and present a poster about the applications for nano-rope that they developed for their community (Fig. 1). A short discussion about how different communities use technology in different ways concludes the activity. The goal is for the students to see how different communities would use the same technology – in this case nano-rope – in different ways, depending on the community’s needs and wants. A full description of the activity is available on the “Educator Resources” page of the IPSE web-site5.

Figure 1. Parents and children create a poster for their NanoCommunity at a Science Saturday outreach event on the UW campus.

Engaging middle-school students in critical thinking about science, technology and society, especially in relation to nanotechnology – a topic with which many of them are unfamiliar – proved to be a challenging task. Our effort involved a collaboration of individuals from diverse fields, including public policy, history of science, and life sciences communication, in addition to science and engineering. Anderson, who was a Life Sciences Com-munication graduate student, worked with Dr. J. Aura Gimm, the IPSE program coordinator; Greta Zenner, who has a background in history of science and is the UW MRSEC science editor; and Prof. Clark Miller, a faculty content expert from the UW La Follette School of Public Affairs who specializes in nanotechnology and risk. The team brain-stormed about several possible ideas for classroom activities, including debates and class discussions about risk and fear of new technologies, before settling on the NanoCommunities focus. Experience from the previous two years of the IPSE program, coupled with advice from those who work with middle-school students on related science and society issues, including teachers and science museum staff, made it clear that the complex nature of topics such as risk and fear were too difficult to be effectively taught in most middle-school classrooms, especially through a discussion or lecture-only approach. Instead, our experience and the advice of others highlighted the importance of relating our discussions about technology and society to the students’ own lives. An effective method of doing this is through role-playing. “NanoCommunities” uses these two strategies by first relating technology and society discussions to familiar objects and then asking students to role-play and create new applications of nanotechnology. Students appeared to grasp the issues more easily with this approach than they likely would have using only discussion or lecture. After deciding upon a general approach for the activity, we used an iterative process to further develop and refine “NanoCommunities.” With



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the guidance and advice of her advisors, Anderson created a presentation describing the activity idea, and, after giving the presentation to the entire team of IPSE interns and advisors and receiving feedback in the form of survey responses and group discussion, she created a first draft. Anderson led this and subsequent versions of the activity with her fellow interns and, eventually, middle-school teachers to obtain feedback. This process and the teachers in particular were crucial to ensuring age-appropriateness, length, and interest. Following revisions based on the interns’ and teachers’ feedback, Anderson took her activity into the classroom, leading it numerous times in several Madison- and Milwaukee-area schools and continually revising it based upon students’ feedback in each class. After a semester of leading “NanoCommunities” with middle-school students, Anderson prepared a written summary of her activity, and it was posted it on our IPSE web-site 6. In addition, she published both a written and an on-line article about her activity in Science Scope, a publication for middle-school teachers by the National Science Teachers Association 7.

Subsequently, this activity was modified to use a combination of small-group and classroom discussion, shortened to 20-minutes, and implemented in two college-level classes at UW during a presentation on the topic of nanotechnology and society. Students are presented with the idea of a new ultra-strong nanocomposite and asked to brainstorm about potential applications of this technology for their assigned NanoCommunity. The teams each present their top design, and the range of the community-relevant ideas clearly illustrates the interaction between technology development and societal needs. Students then spend a few more minutes with their team to discuss the future ramifications of their top idea, both positive and negative. A student from a course entitled “Introduction to Engineering” commented in a journal that was kept for the course that the activity “reminds us that we are working for and with people. Sometimes I think we get [so] caught up in

calculations and budgeting that we forget that our actions will affect others.” Incorporating materials science and nanotechnology into a high-school chemistry course During the 2000-01 academic year, we worked with two high-school teachers in Madison, WI, Ann Comins and Bruce Swanson, to bring concepts from materials science and nanotechnology that were developed through the UW MRSEC into traditional, introductory high-school chemistry courses. Comins and Swanson were supported during part of the summers of 2000, 2001, and 2002 through an NSF program called Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) (Fig. 2). The RET program partners K-12 teachers with researchers to enable the teachers to participate in cutting-edge research. We used the program in a somewhat different way to carry out “educational technology transfer,” whereby instructional materials were created to communicate aspects of current research areas to pre-college students. The objective of this project was to teach core scientific concepts using cutting-edge examples and to raise awareness of the exciting scientific career opportunities in materials science and nanotechnology.

Figure 2. Ann Comins, a chemistry teacher at James Madison Memorial High School, in Madison, WI, helped to develop educational kits about nanoscale science and engineering during part of time with the UW MRSEC RET program



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Crucial to this effort was assistance by two graduate students, Jeremiah Neubert and Cynthia Carter, who were simultaneously supported through NSF’s GK-12 program, called “K-Through-Infinity” on the UW campus. The GK-12 program paired graduate students with K-12 teachers and students to bring current research ideas into the GK-12 curriculum. Swanson, Comins, Neubert, Carter, and the UW MRSEC researchers who ensured the technical accuracy of the modules comprised a team that organized the development and implementation of a set of modules for use in high-school chemistry classes. The synergistic convergence of UW MRSEC, RET, and GK-12 resources allowed us to develop an ambitious agenda that led to the creation of a suite of new instructional materials in a relatively short time. These resources may be accessed on the web 8. A description of the materials and the process that led to their development has been published 9. Over the course of the RET/GK-12 project, a kit developed through the UW MRSEC, “Exploring the Nanoworld” 10, was used as the basis for three instructional modules devoted to scanning probe microscopy and X-ray diffraction, light-emitting diodes (LEDs), and shape memory alloys (NiTi, “memory metal”) (Fig. 3). During the second summer of the project, a module devoted to the preparation of ferrofluids was added, and the modules developed the preceding summer were revised; the diffraction module, in particular, was streamlined. In the third summer, the ferrofluid module was refined, and some experiments involving the preparation of gold nanoparticles were conducted. For each module the team created teacher and student versions of experimental investigations, guided notes, library activities, review materials, and assessment tools. All of the modules were also aligned with the National Science Education Standards 11.

The initial testing of the modules took place with the materials being used as a separate unit in chemistry courses taught by Comins and Swanson. The teachers had their own

classrooms, but they taught the same course at the same school, which allowed them to share ideas and evaluate on a daily basis both the content of the “Exploring the Nanoworld” modules and the way they used the modules. Through informal student surveys, the teachers found that although the students responded well to some parts of the modules, they felt that the instructional materials were not an integral part of the course. Students needed to have more obvious connections made between the “nano” modules and the traditional chemistry concepts in the rest of the course.

Figure 3. Comins is shown on the left with a student exploring the results of the phase transformation induced in NiTi memory metal by dipping it in hot water. This and other experiments are included in the “Exploring the Nanoworld” kit that was adapted into high school curriculum modules

In the following academic year, the instructors integrated the modules into the course rather than use them as stand-alone units. The RET/GK-12 team also worked with UW campus assessment experts in the Learning through Evaluation, Adaptation and Dissemination (LEAD) center to develop assessment tools that complied with human subjects considerations and allowed for a more rigorous assessment of the modules. Assessment data indicated that the integrated



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approach was a more effective way to use the materials. One metric of impact is that parents of several of the students who used the modules have commented that their children, who are now in college, have favorably recalled the experience of working with the materials. The RET/GK-12 instructional materials have subsequently been described at a variety of conferences, including the Wisconsin Society of Science Teachers annual meeting. In addition, over the course of several summers, the Institute for Chemical Education at UW hosted dozens of high-school teachers from around the country and introduced them to the instructional materials developed through the RET/GK-12 program. Incorporating cutting-edge research into an undergraduate laboratory experiment During her doctoral research, Anne Bentley, who was an NSF Graduate Fellow in the Department of Chemistry at UW, developed an interest in bringing aspects of her research into the science classroom. Her doctoral studies were supervised jointly by faculty members in the Departments of Chemistry and Engineering Physics. At the time, Bentley was using a template synthesis technique to create nanorods

of CuSn alloys, capped with Ni at both ends. The magnetic caps permitted positional manipulation of the nanorods by use of applied magnetic fields 12. Bentley believed that this method of nanorod production and magnetic manipulation could be adapted for use in high-school, undergraduate, and graduate laboratory courses. At the outset, we realized that this would require simplification of the experimental procedures, reduction in the expense of the equipment needed, and minimization in the cost of materials and supplies, particularly if the lab were to be usable in an undergraduate or high-school setting. The lab that was developed presents a simple way to make nanowires using a mold or template: nickel nanowires are grown by electrodeposition inside the nanoscale pores of an alumina filter, and then the filter is dissolved to yield the liberated nanowires1. The nanowires are made of nickel, which allows them to be manipulated with a magnetic field (Fig. 4). Their 200-nm diameter and large aspect ratio also allow them to be observed optically. The lab helps students to explore a variety of topics, including electrochemistry, magnetism, materials science, and nanotechnology.

Figure 4. Nickel nanowires can be controlled by a magnetic field and observed in an optical microscope due to their large aspect ratio. The optical image on the left shows a collection of nanowires suspended in water. The image on the right shows a Chemistry 311 student at the University of Wisconsin - Madison observing the nanowires while his lab partner manipulates their orientation with a magnet.



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Several technical challenges were tackled in the development process with the assistance of an undergraduate research assistant, Mohammed Farhoud. One particular challenge was the creation of a conductive layer on one side of the filter membrane that would cover the pore openings, without filling the pores, and that would provide points for electrical contact to the ends of the ~1 billion pores present throughout the membrane. In Bentley’s research project, the electrical connection is created by sputter deposition of a thin layer of silver, but sputtering equipment is not routinely available in undergraduate and high-school laboratories. The trial-and-error process of developing a viable alternative took several months, but eventually a simple and inexpensive procedure was created, in which a cotton applicator is used to apply liquid GaIn alloy onto the surface of the filter membrane. While it is important to fully coat the surface to prevent leaks, the GaIn can be spread quite thinly to thoroughly coat the membrane. Once the basic experimental procedure was completed, the individual steps of the laboratory experiment were filmed for the on-line, video-based Lab Manual for Nanoscale Science and Technology, a product of the UW MRSEC 13. This manual was then used to test the lab in several different types of classes at three institutions. Crucial to the lab development process was the collaboration of several faculty members who tested the lab in their classrooms and helped to fine-tune the procedures and supplement the learning objectives. These faculty included Prof. George Lisensky, who tested the lab at Beloit College (Beloit, WI) with a class of first-year non-science-majors enrolled in a colloquium course on nanotechnology; Prof. Anne-Marie Nickel, who tested the lab at the Milwaukee School of Engineering (MSOE) (Milwaukee, WI) in a general chemistry course for students in engineering and nursing; and Prof. Donald Stone, who tested the lab at UW in a junior-level materials science laboratory course.

The first field tests of the lab were exceptionally valuable in identifying several pitfalls in the procedure and clarifications needed in the manual. In the first two trials, at MSOE and UW, only 3 of 12 and 5 of 9 laboratory teams were successful in making the nanowires, respectively. Between each of the early implementation trials, Bentley and Farhoud made refinements that could be tested. After refinements were complete, the lab was tested in the same classes at MSOE and UW in subsequent semesters and produced 100% success for all lab teams at both institutions. The lab was then disseminated more broadly to other faculty colleagues to see whether it could be successfully implemented by individuals who had not been involved in its development. The fully tested experiment has been described in an article written for the Journal of Chemical Education 1. Bentley organized the writing of the article and is the lead author. To broaden the learning objectives of the experiment, Profs. Lisensky and Nickel conducted experiments in deposition rate at their respective institutions. This extension of the lab was included in the full journal publication of the procedure 1. Additionally, several new optical experiments were developed using suspensions of the nickel nanowires placed in a magnetic field. These experiments were filmed and added to the on-line version of the lab manual as advanced topics of exploration 13. At these later stages, new research and educational materials development occurred in tandem, clearly showing the synergy that can be achieved by broadening research objectives to include educational goals. Beyond the creation of a new teaching laboratory experiment that gives students first-hand experience in the world of nanotechnology by allowing them to create and manipulate nanomaterials, the laboratory development process was also instrumental in the professional development of the graduate and undergraduate students who created and



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refined the experiment. Students and the collaborating faculty have made several conference presentations about the lab, and the lab as well as its assessment appeared as a dissertation chapter in Bentley’s doctoral thesis. In addition, as students and faculty colleagues find new ways to expand the lab, these variations can be incorporated into the UW MRSEC’s on-line lab manual.

CONCLUSIONS Creating educational materials based on cutting-edge research can engage students in science and engineering and help them to feel more connected to current research, to develop more interest in general science and engineering, and to learn more effectively. We have identified four strategies we have found to be effective in this challenging process: collaboration, graduate and undergraduate student involvement, an iterative development process, and new and challenging concepts. We believe that these strategies can promote the integration of research and education in a broad range of settings, and we invite readers to share their thoughts and experiences with us by contacting us at [email protected]. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We would like to thank Cynthia Carter, Jeremiah Neubert, Ann Comins, Bruce Swanson, Anne Bentley, Mohammed Farhoud, Megan Anderson, George Lisensky, Clark Miller, Anne-Marie Nickel, Donald Stone and J. Aura Gimm for their help in creating the nanotechnology education materials. We are grateful to the National Science Foundation through the Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC) on Nanostructured Materials and Interfaces at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (DMR-0079983), the Research Experience for Teachers (RET) program (DMR-0079983), the Internships in Public Science Education (IPSE) program (DMR-0120897), the Distinguished

Teaching Scholar (DTS) program (DMR-0123904), the Graduate Teaching Fellows in GK12 Initiative (K-Through-Infinity) (DGE-0139335), and Bentley’s NSF Graduate Research Fellowship for supporting the development of our curricular materials and their implementation. We thank J. Aura Gimm and Prof. George Lisensky for assistance with the photographs in this article.

REFERENCES 1. Anne K. Bentley, Mohammed Farhoud,

Arthur B. Ellis, George C. Lisensky, Anne-Marie L. Nickel and Wendy C. Crone, J. Chem. Ed. 82, 765 (2005).

2. Vaille Dawson and Renato Schibeci, Intl. J. Sci. Ed. 25, 57 (2003).

3. Rochelle D. Schwartz-Bloom and Myra J. Halpin J. Research in Sci. Teaching 40, 922 (2003).

4. Amy C. Payne, Wendy A. deProphetis, Arthur B. Ellis, Thomas G. Derenne, Greta M. Zenner and Wendy C. Crone, J. Chem. Ed. 82, 743 (2005).

5. http://www.mrsec.wisc.edu/edetc/IPSE/educators

6. http://www.mrsec.wisc.edu/Edetc/IPSE/educators/nanoComm.html.

7. Megan Anderson, Greta M. Zenner and J.Aura Gimm, Science Scope 28, 20 (2004). Also available at http://www.nsta.org/main/news/stories/science_scope.php?news_story_ID=49916.

8. http://www.mrsec.wisc.edu/edetc/modules/index.html

9. Jeremiah J. Neubert, Cynthia G. Widstrand, Ann M. Pumper, C. Bruce Swanson, and Arthur B. Ellis, 2001 ASEE Ann. Conf. & Expo. Session 1519a (2001).

10. http://www.mrsec.wisc.edu/edetc/supplies/kit/index.html

11. http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/nses/html/

12. A.K. Bentley, J.S. Trethewey, A.B. Ellis and W.C. Crone, Nano Letters 4, 487 (2004).

13. http://www.mrsec.wisc.edu/edetc/nanolab/index.htl

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STRATEGIES FOR DEVELOPING CUTTING-EDGE CURRICULUM …silver.neep.wisc.edu/~mandm/faculty_pages/crone/PDF/JME_curriculu… · STRATEGIES FOR DEVELOPING CUTTING-EDGE CURRICULUM