How does energy flow in and out of our atmosphere? Explore how solar and infrared radiation enters and exits the atmosphere with an interactive model. Control the amounts of carbon dioxide and clouds present in the model and learn how these factors can influence global temperature. Record results using snapshots of the model in the virtual lab notebook where you can annotate your observations.

Students practice human-centered design by imagining, designing and prototyping a product to improve classroom accessibility for the visually impaired. To begin, they wear low-vision simulation goggles (or blindfolds) and walk with canes to navigate through a classroom in order to experience what it feels like to be visually impaired. Student teams follow the steps of the engineering design process to formulate their ideas, draw them by hand and using free, online Tinkercad software, and then 3D-print (or construct with foam core board and hot glue) a 1:20-scale model of the classroom that includes the product idea and selected furniture items. Teams use a morphological chart and an evaluation matrix to quantitatively compare and evaluate possible design solutions, narrowing their ideas into one final solution to pursue. To conclude, teams make posters that summarize their projects.

The course is an introduction to the approach of Reflective Practice developed by Donald Schön. It is an approach that enables professionals to understand how they use their knowledge in practical situations and how they can combine practice and learning in a more effective way. Through greater awareness of how they deploy their knowledge in practical situations, professionals can increase their capacities of learning in a more timely way. Understanding how they frame situations and ideas helps professionals to achieve greater flexibility and increase their capacity of conceptual innovation.
The objective of the course is to introduce students to the approach and methods of reflective practice by raising their awareness about their own cognitive resources and how they use them in their practice. The course will introduce theories of learning, knowledge generation, framing and reframing, theories of action, reflection-in-practice, and conceptual innovation, and provide students with opportunities to experiment with these theories in real life through practical exercises in which they reflect on real situations that they have faced in their past professional experience. Through these practical exercises, students will have the opportunity to reflect on their thinking capacities in the context of their practice.

Most algorithms in computer vision and image analysis can be understood in terms of two important components: a representation and a modeling/estimation algorithm. The representation defines what information is important about the objects and is used to describe them. The modeling techniques extract the information from images to instantiate the representation for the particular objects present in the scene. In this seminar, we will discuss popular representations (such as contours, level sets, deformation fields) and useful methods that allow us to extract and manipulate image information, including manifold fitting, markov random fields, expectation maximization, clustering and others.
For each concept – a new representation or an estimation algorithm – a lecture on the mathematical foundations of the concept will be followed by a discussion of two or three relevant research papers in computer vision, medical and biological imaging, that use the concept in different ways. We will aim to understand the fundamental techniques and to recognize situations in which these techniques promise to improve the quality of the analysis.

By reading a short book aloud, Rick Kleine models for his students how their initial theories of character traits can change over time. Using peer discussion and class participation, the kids are engaged throughout, giving them what Rick hopes will be a life-long love of reading.

Given a hypothetical civil engineering scenario, student pairs are tasked to apply their knowledge of the rock cycle, rock types, rock weathering and the engineering design process to model a potential method to create a sandy beach from three rocky island shorelines. For their abrasion weathering models, they use wide-mouth lidded jars and three types of candies that serve as the testing “rocks.” They simulate both low- and high-energy weathering environments. After completing the simple weathering techniques and analyzing their observations of the results, they conclude by recommending to the island developer which rocky shoreline would be the easiest, simplest, and most cost-effective from which to create a sandy beach. A worksheet and pre/post quiz are provided.

Use a virtual scanning tunneling microscope (STM) to observe electron behavior in an atomic-scale world. Walk through the principles of this technology step-by-step. First learn how the STM works. Then try it yourself! Use a virtual STM to manipulate individual atoms by scanning for, picking up, and moving electrons. Finally, explore the advantages and disadvantages of the two modes of an STM: the constant-height mode and the constant-current mode.

The Second Grade Elementary Framework for Science and Integrated Subjects, How Can Dams Change the Land Around Them, uses a local phenomena of impact of the Wanapum Dam on the Columbia River and a crack in that dam to understand erosion and changes in the landscape.  It is part of Elementary Framework for Science and Integrated Subjects project, a statewide Clime Time collaboration among ESD 123, ESD 105, North Central ESD, and the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction. Development of the resources is in response to a need for research- based science lessons for elementary teachers that are integrated with English language arts, mathematics and other subjects such as social studies. The template for Elementary Science and Integrated Subjects  can serve as an organized, coherent and research-based roadmap for teachers in the development of their own NGSS aligned science lessons.  Lessons can also be useful for classrooms that have no adopted curriculum as well as to serve as enhancements for  current science curriculum. The EFSIS project brings together grade level teams of teachers to develop lessons or suites of lessons that are 1) pnenomena based, focused on grade level Performance Expectations, and 2) leverage ELA and Mathematics Washington State Learning Standards.

Explore your own straight-line motion using a motion sensor to generate distance versus time graphs of your own motion. Learn how changes in speed and direction affect the graph, and gain an understanding of how motion can be represented on a graph.

Semiconductors are the materials that make modern electronics work. Learn about the basic properties of intrinsic and extrinsic or 'doped' semiconductors with several visualizations. Turn a silicon crystal into an insulator or a conductor, create a depletion region between semiconductors, and explore probability waves of an electron in this interactive activity.

Student teams design and build solar water heating devices that mimic those used in residences to capture energy in the form of solar radiation and convert it to thermal energy. In this activity, students gain a better understanding of the three different types of heat transfer, each of which plays a role in the solar water heater design. Once the model devices are constructed, students perform efficiency calculations and compare designs.

This class focuses on representation tools used by architects during the design process and attempts to discuss the relationship they develop with the object of design. Representation plays a key role in architectural design, not only as a medium of conveying and narrating a determined meaning or a preconceived idea, but also as a code of creating new meaning, while the medium seeks to establish a relationship with itself. In this sense, mediums of representation, as external parameters to the design process, are not neutral tools of translating an idea into its concrete form. They are neither authentic means of creativity, nor vapid carriers of an idea. Therefore, an important aspect in issues of meaning is how the architect manipulates the play of translating a concept to its concrete version, through the use of a medium of representation. The course is a continuation of the equivalent course taught in the fall semester and specifically focuses on digital media. The course is intended to establish a reciprocal relationship with the design studio, feeding from and contributing to its content.

What happens when an excited atom emits a photon? What can we deduce about that atom based on the photons it can emit? A series of interactive models allows you to examine how the energy levels the electrons of an atom occupy affect the types of photons that can be emitted. Use a digital spectrometer to record which wavelengths certain atoms will emit, and then use this knowledge to compare and identify types of atoms. Students will be abe to:

This course uses computer-based methods for the analysis of large-scale structural systems. Topics covered include: modeling strategies for complex structures; application to tall buildings, cable-stayed bridges, and tension structures; introduction to the theory of active structural control; design of classical feedback control systems for civil structures; and simulation studies using customized computer software.

This course deals with structural components in nuclear power plant systems, their functional purposes, operating conditions, and mechanical-structural design requirements. It combines mechanics techniques with models of material behavior to determine adequacy of component design. Considerations include mechanical loading, brittle fracture, in-elastic behavior, elevated temperatures, neutron irradiation, and seismic effects.

Students observe natural selection in action and investigate the underlying mechanism, including random mutation and differential fitness based on environmental characteristics. They do this through use of the free AVIDA-ED digital evolution software application.

One objective of 15.066J is to introduce modeling, optimization and simulation, as it applies to the study and analysis of manufacturing systems for decision support. The introduction of optimization models and algorithms provide a framework to think about a wide range of issues that arise in manufacturing systems. The second objective is to expose students to a wide range of applications for these methods and models, and to integrate this material with their introduction to operations management.

This class is an applications-oriented course covering the modeling of large-scale systems in decision-making domains and the optimization of such systems using state-of-the-art optimization tools. Application domains include: transportation and logistics planning, pattern classification and image processing, data mining, design of structures, scheduling in large systems, supply-chain management, financial engineering, and telecommunications systems planning. Modeling tools and techniques include linear, network, discrete and nonlinear optimization, heuristic methods, sensitivity and post-optimality analysis, decomposition methods for large-scale systems, and stochastic optimization.
This course was also taught as part of the Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA) programme as course number SMA 5223 (System Optimisation: Models and Computation).

This course covers the thermo-fluid dynamic phenomena and analysis methods for conventional and nuclear power stations. Specific topics include: kinematics and dynamics of two-phase flows; steam separation; boiling, instabilities, and critical conditions; single-channel transient analysis; multiple channels connected at plena; loop analysis including single and two-phase natural circulation; and subchannel analysis.

This course introduces students to the theory and practice of modeling phonology, with an empirical focus on modeling the discovery of static phonotactics, the discovery of alternations, learning in the midst of variation and exceptions, and the discovery of gradient patterns. This course is also intended to provide hands-on experience with various aspects of using and developing models, including preparing training data, running simulations, and interpreting their results.