Whenever an Engineer begins a project, the first question that (s)he asks is, "What has already been created that can help me learn more about this problem?" The engineer must find what has been done, what other engineers are doing, and (s)he must learn the appropriate background about the problem so that (s)he can provide the best solution possible.
As your students take on the role of an engineer, the information they gather will also assist them as they begin developing design solutions to their problems. Engineers use the Internet, library, textbooks, journals, experimental data, laboratory analysis, and analytical derivation as sources of scientific information.
Your Students will explore these ideas through hands-on experiments. They will formulate and test hypotheses to help them begin determining how they will solve their problem. Our hope is that as they "Research and Investigate" they will become more informed, interested, and excited about being given the chance to creatively propose a design solution to their problem.