Tangibles for Teaching and Learning: Week 2
MagneTracks
MagneTracks is a toolkit for teaching Newtonian physics. MagneTracks helps children create and test their own frameworks and create a mental model through their own tangible experience which will help support what they learn about empirically proven theories. This mix of traditional classroom learning, being supported by hands on activities seems really effective. I like that they mentioned HotWheels as a way to teach kids about physics and the MagneTracks toy supplements that lesson of gravity by showing mathmatical equations using computer vision. I remember, years after taking Trigonometry I saw a gif kind of like this:
I remember thinking how much more sense it made once I had a moving visual to help me understand. I saw something similar for the pythagorean theorem which was even better but I can’t find it. It’s one thing to memorize an equation and be able to plug in the right variables but it’s a completely different thing to truly grasp the information. The reason why I forgot trigonometry the second I closed my textbook for the last time is because I never really understood. So placing the equations in the context of tactile teaching tools seems like a promising way to connect the equations with our lived experiences with physical phenomenon.
Understanding the Problem:
Design Research
Design Research; Qualitative vs. Quantitative. This discussion is interesting because I kind of imagine everything I do as research, and I don’t consider that research or the conclusions I draw as being objective, I just note cause and effect. Every time I speak to someone, I take note of how I phrase something and compare it to how the individual responds. I then compare that to all the other data I have collected in every interaction I’ve ever had with someone and can analyze both how what I said might come across based on response and also what the response might tell me about the other person. I might not be an objective judge of anything, because whatever I do is tainted by my perception and experiences. But at the very least, I can judge how my tainted worldview appraised one thing vs. another because both things were being processed by me. While I’m an unreliable narrator in a lot of ways, when it’s the same unreliable narrator judging two different things, you can still compare the difference. I’ve always been far more interested in quantitative data. Quantitative data can let you know that something was sufficient for 90% of users, but it doesn’t let you know how to supplement for the other 10%. Even if it does, I imagine that quantitative data exists within the already existing confines of a project, rather than extending beyond the bounds creatively. For example, you could determine that 3% more people find an app easier to use if the text is shifted 10 pixels to the left. However, maybe it becomes accessible to 10% more people if the project isn’t even an app at all. Maybe the project doesn’t work to begin with or does more harm than good when viewed in a greater context. Those higher level questions are much better suited from qualitative discussions with individuals.