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Assignment
for One Credit Letter Grade Option
Overview
This one credit letter grade option is
offered to students whose schedule does not permit working on a team-based
project in ENGR110/210, but who wish to receive a letter grade.
For your assignment you are asked to
interview an individual with a disability or an older adult, choose and pursue
a specific project activity, present your work, submit a final comprehensive
final project report that encompasses your efforts for the entire quarter, and
reflect on your experiences.
Contents
Required Course and Individual Project Activities
The required course and project
activities for students working on an individual project for one credit and a
letter grade are:
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Participate fully in the class
including attending lectures as required, listening actively, posing questions
to the guest speakers and the course instructor, engaging in class discussions,
verbalizing thoughts and analyses, reading and responding to emails from the
course instructor, and communicating project progress.
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Attend at least 10 lectures,
including the first lecture, Introduction to
Assistive Technology.
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Meet with the course instructor
during the second week of classes to discuss and agree upon an assistive
technology project and to report progress during the quarter.
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Interview an
individual with a disability or older adult, consisting of an overview of the
individual's life, challenges being faced, successes achieved, desires for the
future.
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Review of
assistive technology used, their usefulness and limitations, problems
experienced, and similar products on the market.
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Focus on one of
these activities that relates to or would potentially benefit the interviewed
older adult or individual with a disability:
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Research an assistive
technology topic - report on new products and research under
development.
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Pursue a "paper design" of
an assistive technology device - develop a CAD design or a "low resolution"
physical device built from foam-core or other prototyping
material.
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Create a work of art -
create an original poem, song, skit, painting, or video. (This option would be
of particular interest to students who have skills and expertise other than
engineering.)
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Engage in an aftermarket
aesthetic design - select an existing assistive product that could benefit
from a better appearance, contact the manufacturer, and work with a user of the
device to improve its aesthetic appeal.
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Engage in an aftermarket
functionality / usability design - select an existing assistive product
that could benefit from a better functionality or usability, contact the
manufacturer, and work with a user of the device to improve its functionality
or usability.
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Consider a project from the
Candidate Individual Projects
list
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Give a final
presentation of about 15 minutes in length to be scheduled outside of class
time during the week of February 29th that
includes PowerPoint slides, photographs, and short videos as described
below.
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Submit a final report that
documents the entire quarter's effort and addresses the elements described
below. Individual final reports are due
Monday, March 14th.
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Submit an Individual Reflection as described
below. Individual reflections are due Monday,
March 14th.
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Individual Project Presentation
Week
of February 29th
Schedule a presentation time (the
presentation will take place during the week of February 29th) with the course
instructor. Describe your project work in a 15-minute presentation that may
employ PowerPoint slides, photographs, and short videos. Other students and
community members may be in attendance. The presentation should include the
following elements:
- Personal introduction
- Brief project
description
- Overview of the interview with the
older adult or individual with a disability
- Review of assistive technology
employed
- Choice of and rationale for the
selected project activity benefitting the interviewee:
- Discussion of project activity
process: background research, alternatives considered, selected approach,
rationale for choice, prototypes made, and final design
- Project visualizations: photographs,
videos, sketches, drawings, models, prototypes
- Activity demonstration (as
appropriate, depending on project choice)
- Future work and challenges for
continuing the project, including technical feasibility, engineering
difficulty, estimated cost of a commercial product, and market potential (as
appropriate, depending on project choice)
You will be judged on the overall
quality of the presentation, the effectiveness of your design process, and your
design solution using the following metrics:
- Delivery: enthusiasm,
confidence, energy, volume
- Process: problem
identification, research, brainstorming, design selection, fabrication,
testing, and evaluation
- Presentation: clarity,
organization, and completeness of the information presented
- Design: creativity,
originality, functionality of the design as well as the extent to which it
meets the user's needs
Other presentation considerations and
suggestions:
- Anticipate questions from those in
attendance.
- There may be people from industry
attending the presentation, so please dress professionally (no jeans, t-shirts,
or flip-flops).
- Most important - practice your
presentation to maximize the quality of its content, clarity, conciseness,
completeness, understanding of your design decisions, creativity, pacing, and
timing.
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Individual
Project Report
Due Monday - March 14th at
5pm
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Your report should document all
your project efforts using the format below and be at least 10 pages in
length.
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Suggested format for your project
report:
- Cover page - include
course name & year, project title, name, and your photo
- Abstract - one paragraph
summary of objectives, approach taken, and results of the project
- Introduction - problem to
be addressed, problem background
- Objectives - project
goals and rationale
- Design criteria - project
background research, interviews with project suggestors and potential users,
project specifications
- Methods - what did you do
and why - include your evolution of ideas, alternatives considered, selected
approach, prototyping, model building, preliminary testing, calculations,
analysis of final design
- Results - discuss
specifics of your design solution such as features, benefits, aesthetics, cost,
safety, reliability, usability, test results, feedback from users,
etc.
- Discussion - include
challenges and suggestions to further develop and refine the
project
- Next steps - assuming
this project will be pursued in ME113 or as directed study, identify future
challenges and include a timetable of major tasks to fabricate and test a
functional prototype.
- Additional - optionally
address issues relating to technical feasibility, safety considerations,
potential manufacturing, cost of materials, mass production, marketing,
advertising, distribution, sales, licensing,
- Images - add photographs,
drawings, and sketches documenting your design process and activities
throughout the document
- References -
bibliographic and web citations
- Acknowledgements - cite
individuals / facilities who / that helped you
- Appendices - detailed
calculations, testing notes, relevant vendor information, etc. that are
referenced in the main body of the report
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Submit your report in Word or PDF
format by email in Word or PDF format. (The course instructor can print your
final version on a high quality color laser printer if you desire a printed
copy.)
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Individual
Reflection
Due Monday - March 14th at
5pm
Reflect on your class and project
experiences. Provide a discussion (two pages minimum) of your design process,
what you learned, and what was most valuable to you individually. Here are some
items to consider and address:
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Review Learning through Structured
Reflection article.
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You have spent the past quarter
hearing from different professionals and users, interviewing community members,
brainstorming with your instructor, doing background research, looking at prior
art, fabricating and testing a prototype device, etc. Please comment on the
relative value of the different parts of this process toward your
design.
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How did the different interactions
in the class (with users, community members, speakers, professionals, etc.)
contribute to the results of your design? Was any particular interaction
especially rewarding or helpful? Why?
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If you were to go through this
process again, what would you do differently? Was there support from the
teaching staff or course content that was helpful or that you felt was missing?
What advice would you give to future students?
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Additional questions to be
considered for your reflection can be found here.
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Submit your report by
email.
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Grading
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Final
Report
Final Presentation
Individual Reflection
Participation
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30%
30%
10%
30% |
- * Participation includes meeting
with instructor, actively listening, posing questions to the guest speakers and
the course instructor, engaging in class discussions, verbalizing thoughts and
analyses, and submitting Weekly Individual
Reports.
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