Honors College Thesis
 

Evaluation of Adoptability : The Iterative Development of an Energy Production Device for the Middle School Classroom

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https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/honors_college_theses/1g05fd525

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  • This study conducts follow up research to my Mechanical Engineering Senior Project that was completed in March 2015. It follows the Student Powered Hydro and Entertainment Device (SPHED) as it is used in various middle school and high school classrooms. SPHED has three modules: a power generation module, a hydropower module and an entertainment module. The user spins a large acrylic disk on the power generation module to create electricity that can be used by the other two modules. The hydropower module uses this electricity to displace water to a higher potential energy before using the water to power a small water wheel. The entertainment module uses the electricity to power a television that is used for students to play a variation of Pac Man. Rather than a joystick, students are required to work together using four buttons: up, down, left, and right. If the disk stops spinning the TV turns off. My Honors Thesis is an attempt to understand the strengths and weaknesses of SPHED, as well as offer advice to future Mechanical Senior Projects teams. Specifically, this thesis asks how adoptable SPHED is within the standard classroom. Through research, characteristics of adoptable products were determined and with these traits, interview questions were constructed. The questions target key aspects of the device linked to these characteristics and encourages participants to highlight them specifically. Interviews were then conducted with teachers who have directly used the device with their students. While the results were positive, there were a few areas that could improve to create a more adoptable device. Many teachers were concerned with durability and lack of instruction and others felt as thought the entertainment module didn’t hold a lot of educational value. Even with these concerns the overall conclusion is the SPHED is an extremely adoptable product.
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  • Jay Well (SMILE Program Director)
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