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Edheads Engineering - Design a Cell Phone Teacher's Guide
Recommended Grade levels: 5-8
Table of Contents:
- Tips for using site with students
- Assessment and discussion
- Extension activities to do in class:
- Cell Phone activity evaluation results (launch .pdf)
- Ohio Science & Technology Standards
- National Science Standards
Tips for using the site with students 
- Before using this activity in class (or at home with your kids) go through the activity once to make sure it works correctly on your computer(s). If the activity does not load after clicking the 'start' button, you may be asked to download the free Flash Player from Adobe.com. Please click yes, as this allows you to view the Edheads Design a Cell Phone activity. If you are using school computers, you might need to contact your tech support team to download the Flash Player.
- Your computer(s) will need to have some sort of sound output. Either speakers or headphones will work well. The majority of this activity has voice audio. We highly recommend headphones or ear buds in a classroom setting. Hearing impaired students can read the text at the bottom of the screen. If you are having difficulty hearing, check the audio settings on your computer.
- We strongly recommend that students use a real mouse, as the touch pads on lap top computers are more difficult to use for this activity and slow students down significantly.
- We recommend that students take notes during the research section and print their designs or take good notes before proceeding from the design section of the activity to the testing section. This allows them to remember what their design choices were and to evaluate how well the design is working for the intended audience.
- Students in the target grade-range will take approximately 10 to 15 minutes to complete the entire activity.
Assessment and discussion
For an assessment tool, teachers may want to have students print their designs, put their names on them and turn them in. These should indicate if students completed the assigned activity and if they were designing for the intended audience. Print outs can also be used for a class discussion of the variety of designs that had good sales figures.
After students use the site, additional in class discussion questions (which can also act as assessment tools) can be asked:
- Why did we practice designing something for an audience like senior citizens? Why not just design something for middle school students? Answer: Engineers have to understand all sorts of people that are NOT like themselves. Male engineers have to be able to design products that appeal to and can be used easily by women. Women engineers have to be able to design products that can be used by males that may be much taller, larger and heavier than they are. All engineers may be called upon to understand the needs of infants, small children, older adults, radically different conditions like outer space or inside volcanoes, and even how different cultures think. We all need to understand points of view that are not our own, but engineers in particular need to be able to understand the implications of designing products and systems for people that are not identical to themselves.
- Did you have to make choices or trade-offs to design a phone that fit the price and battery life parameters? Could you make all the best choices you wanted to make and fit them into these parameters? Answer: No. For every engineering design decision, there is some sort of trade-off. You can have a much bigger, brighter screen, but this reduces the battery life and increases the size and weight of the phone. Senior citizens may not care that the phone is larger, heavier or has a shorter battery life, but a business person may care a great deal about a shorter battery life if it negatively impacts their business. Every engineer deals with these decisions and trade-offs every day. For instance you can have a large, extremely comfortable and safe SUV as your vehicle, but it typically gets very poor gas mileage, is expensive to drive and maintain and has a large negative impact on the environment. A smaller car may get great gas mileage and be better for the environment, but is not as comfortable nor as likely to keep the occupants safe if a crash occurs. The ‘perfect’ product, if it could even be designed, would probably be too expensive for most of us to afford to buy.
- What is the engineering design process? Answer: 1) research the problem and understand the needs and issues, 2) design the product using the information gained in the research, 3) test the design, possibly with the intended audience, or with machines that test wear, strength, etc., 4) possibly re-design and re-test, if necessary, 5) then launch the product. What are circumstances where re-designing and re-testing might be necessary? Answer: the product is not popular with the intended audience; a product won’t hold the weight or last the amount of time required; the product is too expensive or difficult to produce; the materials chosen don’t deliver the intended results.
- Why did Miranda Overby, the lady with the fox around her neck, not seem to fit in with the rest of the focus group participants? Answer: She is an outlier much more interested in fashion than in functionality. Also, she does not suffer from any physical problems, like hand tremor or poor eyesight, that impact how most of the other focus group participants use cell phones. She is also the youngest participant in the focus group and at the bottom range of the age group considered to be senior citizens.
- Why would a company want to design cell phones for senior citizens if they don’t really like using cell phones? Answer: Seniors are an untapped market and therefore a great way to increase sales. And just because seniors aren’t using current phones doesn’t mean there isn’t a need. It just means current phones are not meeting the need so seniors either aren’t purchasing them or aren’t really using the phones they own.
Ohio Science Standards
Science and Technology
Grade 5
Abilities To Do
Technological
Design |
2. Revise an existing design used to solve a problem based on peer review.
3. Explain how the solution to one problem may create other problems. |
Scientific Inquiry
Doing Scientific
Inquiry |
2. Evaluate observations and measurements made by other people and identify reasons for any discrepancies. |
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3. Use evidence and observations to explain and communicate the results of investigations.
6. Explain why results of an experiment are sometimes different (e.g., because of unexpected differences in what is being investigated, unrealized differences in the methods used or in the circumstances in which the investigation was carried out, and because of errors in observations). |
Scientific Ways of Knowing
Nature of Science |
1. Summarize how conclusions and ideas change as new knowledge is gained.
2. Develop descriptions, explanations and models using evidence to defend/support findings. |
Grade 6
Understanding
Technology |
1. Explain how technology influences the quality of life.
2. Explain how decisions about the use of products and systems can result in desirable or undesirable consequences (e.g., social and environmental).
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Abilities To Do
Technological
Design |
5. Design and build a product or create a solution to a problem given one constraint (e.g., limits of cost and time for design and production, supply of materials and environmental effects). |
Scientific Inquiry
Doing Scientific
Inquiry
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1. Explain that there are not fixed procedures for guiding scientific investigations; however, the nature of an investigation determines the procedures needed. |
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Scientific Ways of Knowing
Nature of Science |
1. Identify that hypotheses are valuable even when they are not supported. |
Ethical Practices |
2. Describe why it is important to keep clear, thorough and accurate records. |
Science and Society |
3. Identify ways scientific thinking is helpful in a variety of everyday settings.
4. Describe how the pursuit of scientific knowledge is beneficial for any career and for daily life. |
Grade 7
Science and Technology
Understanding Technology |
1. Explain how needs, attitudes and values influence the direction of technological development in various cultures. |
Abilities To Do
Technological
Design |
4. Design and build a product or create a solution to a problem given two constraints (e.g., limits of cost and time for design and production or supply of materials and environmental effects). |
Scientific Inquiry
Doing Scientific
Inquiry |
3. Formulate and identify questions to guide scientific investigations that connect to science concepts and can be answered through scientific investigations.
5. Analyze alternative scientific explanations and predictions and recognize that there may be more than one good way to interpret a given set of data.
6. Identify faulty reasoning and statements that go beyond the evidence or misinterpret the evidence.
7. Use graphs, tables and charts to study physical phenomena and infer mathematical relationships between variables (e.g., speed and density). |
Scientific Ways of Knowing
Ethical Practices |
1. Show that the reproducibility of results is essential to reduce bias in scientific investigations. |
Science and Society |
3. Describe how the work of science requires a variety of human abilities and qualities that are helpful in daily life (e.g., reasoning, creativity, skepticism and openness). |
Grade 8
Science and Technology
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2. Examine how choices regarding the use of technology are influenced by constraints caused by various unavoidable factors (e.g., geographic location, limited resources, social, political and economic considerations). |
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Abilities To Do
Technological
Design |
3. Design and build a product or create a solution to a problem given more than two constraints (e.g., limits of cost and time for design and production, supply of materials and environmental effects).
4. Evaluate the overall effectiveness of a product design or solution. |
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Scientific Inquiry
Doing Scientific
Inquiry |
2. Describe the concepts of sample size and control and explain how these affect scientific investigations.
3. Read, construct and interpret data in various forms produced by self and others in both written and oral form (e.g., tables, charts, maps, graphs, diagrams and symbols).
4. Apply appropriate math skills to interpret quantitative data (e.g., mean, median and mode). |
Scientific Ways of Knowing
Nature of Science |
1. Identify the difference between description (e.g., observation and summary) and explanation (e.g., inference, prediction, significance and importance). |
Ethical Practices |
2. Explain why it is important to examine data objectively and not let bias affect observations. |
Academic Content Standards for Technology
Grades 6-8
Benchmark A: Evaluate the aesthetic and functional components of a design and identify creative influences.
Grade 6:
- Describe how design is a creative planning process that leads to useful products and systems.
- Identify appropriate materials (e.g., wood, paper, plastic, aggregates, ceramics, metals, solvents, adhesives) based on specific properties and characteristics (e.g., weight, strength, hardness and flexibility) for the design.
- Apply a design process to solve a problem in the classroom specifying criteria and constraints for the design (e.g., criteria include function, size and materials; constraints include costs, time and user requirements).
- Test and evaluate the design in relation to pre-established requirements, such as criteria and constraints, and refine as needed.
6. Recognize that any design can be improved (e.g., old style scissors work but new ones with plastic on the finger holes are more comfortable and give more surface area for leverage).
- Diagram how design is iterative and involves a set of steps, which can be performed in different sequences and repeated as needed (e.g., identify need, research problem, develop solutions, select best solution, built prototype, test and evaluate, communicate, redesign.)
- Investigate how products are created and communicate findings (e.g., interview an architect, industrial designer, contractor about the processes they follow).
Grade 8
3. Categorize the requirements for a design as either criteria or constraints.
4. Document compromises involved in design (e.g., cost, material availability).
5. Apply a design process to solve a problem in the community (e.g., identify need, research problem, develop solutions, select best solutions, build prototype, test and evaluate, communicate, redesign).
Benchmark B: Recognize the role of engineering design and of testing in the design process
Grade 6
- Describe how engineering design is a subset of the overall design process concerned with the functional aspect of the design.
- Examine how modeling, testing, evaluating and modifying are used to transform ideas into practical solutions (e.g., making adjustments to a model race vehicle to improve performance).
- Describe what an engineer does (e.g., analyze information found on engineering society Web sites).
Grade 7
- Summarize the role of engineering design.
- Describe the relationship between engineering, science and mathematics.
- Describe and test the characteristics of various materials (e.g., strength, color, conductivity).
Grade 8
- Explain how design involves a set of steps that can be performed in different sequences and repeated as needed (e.g., plan – do – study – act; problem analysis – design – coding and debugging – integration – testing and validation; define problem – indentify options – identify best solution – plan how to achieve best solutions – evaluate results).
- Identify how modeling, testing, evaluating and modifying are used to transform ideas into practical solutions.
Benchmark C: Understand and apply research, innovation and invention to problem-solving.
Grade 6
Modify an existing product or system to improve it (e.g., something to improve storage in your locker).
Grade 7
- Explain that understanding the function of an object requires a higher level of thinking than focusing on the object itself.
- Describe how some technological problems are best solved through experimentation.
- Describe and complete an experiment to evaluate the solution to a problem.
National Science Standards for Grades 5-8 
Science as Inquiry:
- Abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry
- Understandings about scientific inquiry
Physical Science:
Science and Technology:
- Abilities of technological design
- Understandings about science and technology
Science in Personal and Social Perspectives:
- Natural and human-induced hazards
- Science and technology in local, national, and global challenges
History and Nature of Science:
- Science as a human endeavor
- Nature of scientific knowledge
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