Upper School Tech Byte #9- Engineering Project

Upper School science teacher Mike shared a project completed by the students in his "Engineering Principles and Practice" course, which is offered as a Science elective.  Students used Google SketchUp, 3D modeling software, to design a space tackling the issue of urban sprawl.  The example Mike shared featured a 100% self-sustainable, all-inclusive community space complete with apartments, underground parking, a restaurant, a gym, a pharmacy, and a clothing store.  The building's highlights included solar panels as well as a geothermal system for heating and cooling.

MEMSET meeting yesterday

Yesterday Colm Eliot, Svetlana Grinshpan, Julia Kelly and I attended the 2nd meeting of the Massachusetts Elementary and Middle School Educational Technologists (MEMSET). This is a new group formed just this year, meeting first at the Brookwood School last October and then at the Tenacre school last night.

The evening included several presentations, dinner and discussion. The group has decided to meet monthly, so if you are interested in attending a meeting, please let your ATS know. The meetings will focus on technology integration in the elementary and middle school grades.

Technologies/Topics of discussion last night included: movie making in world languages classrooms using flipcams, comic life, keynote, stop motion animation software, virtual field trips on iPods, wikispaces, and Google Aps.

Schools in attendance included (but were not limited to): BB&N, Park, Shady Hill, Fessenden, Chestnut Hill, Belmont Day, Fay, Derby Academy, Brookwood, Meadowbrook, Pike, Shore Country Day, Brimmer and May, Kingsley, Ten Acre. Advent, Nashoba Brooks, and Bell South.

-Megan Haddadi