While I knew that this curriculum would be extremely empowering for my students in the long term, I had to think about what would initially engage them in a topic which they had no context of to begin with. A lot of the time it is easier for first grade students to understand the world around them. They spend a lot of time during the year learning about their own community.
“In most 1st grade classrooms, students begin to explore their communities and the world around them more deeply, enhancing their research skills and general knowledge of the world around them”
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. I knew that I would be able to use this to my advantage. One of the current “Grand Challenges” that engineers are concerned about is urban infrastructure. Since my students mostly live in New Haven, CT and all attend school in New Haven I knew that I would be able to get them thinking about how to make their community a better place to live. I did not want to phrase the problem in a way that made it seem like a city was a bad place to live. And I also wanted to use a more scientific term, so I decided that I would interest my students by asking them how they could make their community more sustainable.
In order to make this curriculum feasible I had to research and teach my students about certain ideas to help them think like an engineer. I would need to be able to explain to them what the field of environmental engineering is, and what the goal is for these types of engineers. I would also need to be able to explain what sustainability is in terms that a six-year-old would understand. My students would also need to learn about urban infrastructure, why is it built the way that it is? And why are many cities seeing problems with their infrastructure now? Many cities also experience what is known as the urban heat island effect, I would have to teach my class about the factors that make this occur. Lastly, before they could think of their own ways to make our community more sustainable they would need to know about types of alternative energy that are already in place. We will be learning about solar panels (which are installed on our roof at school), wind energy (since New Haven has a wind turbine), and how plants are currently being used to cool off other cities. Students would not only need to learn about how these types of energy work. But also, how they can help our climate in the future. Learning about and discussing these different topics would eventually help my students to think about their own ideas and create something to make our own community more sustainable.