The project is a collaborative effort involving Manhattan College, the University of Kentucky, and Bucknell University that uses the skills possessed by a media savvy generation of students to enhance conceptual learning of thermodynamics. The project is having students develop instructional videos that teache a concept in thermodynamics using common metaphors, and then watch similarly constructed instructional videos developed by peers at a different institution. The former employs autodidactic learning, while the latter takes advantage of peer-to-peer learning. To measure the effects of these treatments on conceptual learning, the investigators are conducting a baseline assessment using a thermodynamics concept inventory and a post-treatment assessment using a similar instrument. Additionally, student affective domain responses are being measured with a questionnaire. The collection of videos is being made available through prominent springboards, such as the resources section of the AIChE Education Division Website and the NSDL library, and they are being aggressively promoted using a press kit sent out to those who teach thermodynamics and similar courses at other institutions as well as through further distribution of the kit at national conferences (e.g., ASEE and AIChE). Traditional dissemination efforts include faculty workshops at national meetings, conference presentations, and journal publications. Broader impacts include the strong dissemination effort with video postings on YouTube and the aggressive promotion of the approach through various mechanisms.
