Liesl Baum

From rhetoric to real world: fostering higher order thinking through transdisciplinary collaboration

Ill-structured problems abound that require sophisticated problem-solving skills, knowledge across multiple domains and the abilities to think critically and communicate effectively. Despite the abundance of rhetoric supporting the need to build these skills in our students, the acquisition of domain-specific knowledge is still the primary focus of most disciplines. Students who have not mastered these skills and possess only domain-specific knowledge will be underprepared to successfully contribute to the solutions to these problems. The IDEA Studio at Virginia Tech implemented a transdisciplinary collaborative learning environment in an effort to bring these skills out of the literature and into the real-world classroom. This paper describes our strategies, the dominant themes that drove our course structure, the challenges we faced and the lessons learned.

Form, function and performances in a musical instrument MAKErs camp

This experience report presents the planning, execution and results of an exploratory 5-day musical instrument MAKErs camp for K-12 students. Students used various hardware sensors, a graphical programming environment and different physical prototyping techniques to create musical instruments. The design of a musical instrument introduces students to the full spectrum of the design process including form factor and function. Throughout the camp, students shared and performed in front of their peers to gain feedback as they iterated through the design of a musical instrument.