Development of Engineering Activities

Summary

This report focuses on developing and selecting effective engineering activities that are targeted for Grade 7-10 girls.  The activities are used at an event called Go ENG Girl, which is run by the Women in Engineering Committee at the University of Waterloo.  The event is meant to properly educate younger generations of females regarding post-secondary options and break old stereotypes surrounding the engineering profession, in order to ultimately attract more women to engineering.
 
The objective of this report is to determine which engineering activities should be implemented as promotional activities for the Women in Engineering Committee’s Go ENG Girl event.

The assessment criteria are used to rank the suitability of the activities based on their effectiveness from the designer’s end as well as the activity’s appeal to participants.  The two scores are averaged for each activity to give an overall effectiveness score. 

The activities that proved to be the most suitable for the event were the Web Browser, the Wind Turbine, the Solar Still, and the Hydraulic Arm.  It is recommended that another co-op student be hired at least yearly to develop more activities and survey participants to improve the evaluation criteria.

1.0 Introduction

In the modern world, diversity is widely recognized as a key tool for producing fresh ideas and preventing stagnation.  In the business and academic worlds, workers and scholars with different backgrounds and perspectives are able, now more than ever, to combine their methods of thinking to produce better solutions and ideas than are possible with just a single method of thought.

Even with quotas and incentives that encourage minorities to join under-represented fields, there is still a vast level of disparity in many areas of work.  In some cases, organizations have been created specifically to target minorities and expose and attract them to under-represented fields.  A growing and problematic example of this type of inequality is the sparse number of females in engineering and technological fields.

At the University of Waterloo, female enrolment in first year engineering remained fairly constant from 1998 (21%) to 2002 (23%) [1].  More recently, however, a significant decrease was observed with 17% in 2003 and 13% in 2004 [1].  The University created the Women in Engineering Committee as a part of a Task Force to approach this problem, but the statistics are still low.

Arguably the most effective way to approach this problem is to properly educate younger generations of females regarding post-secondary options and break old stereotypes surrounding the engineering profession. 

The objective of this report is to determine which engineering activities should be implemented as promotional activities for the Women in Engineering Committee’s Go ENG Girl event.  The event is held annually for Grade 7-10 girls.  Two activities are usually performed at the event (one for the Grade 7-8 girls; one for the Grade 9-10 girls).

The report includes a set of objective criteria that can be used to measure effectiveness of an activity from multiple perspectives, an overview of the activities that exist for Go ENG Girl, and a comparison of previously used and newly developed activities for the event.
 
2.0 Development of Assessment Criteria

The development of standard assessment criteria is useful for maintaining consistency in comparison.  The assessment criteria for the Go ENG Girl engineering activities is divided into two areas of interest: the effectiveness of the activities from the perspective of the designer (in this case the Women in Engineering Committee), and the appeal of the activities from the point of view of the participants. 

2.1 Designer Criteria

The Women in Engineering (WIE) Committee’s goal through Go ENG Girl is to educate young females about the prospects and breadth of engineering in hopes that they will pursue an engineering education and decrease the disparity of women in engineering.  In order to achieve this goal, certain stereotypes about the engineering profession need to be broken.  Particularly, the activities need to illustrate that engineering has a meaningful impact on peoples’ lives and is multidisciplinary in nature.

Impact:  Almost everyday, people put their lives into the hands of engineers.  Whether they’re riding engineered airplane, living in an engineered house, or driving an engineered car on an engineered highway, people are trusting engineers with their lives.  Because of the grave responsibilities of public and environmental safety, engineers have a profound impact on society.  Many people with a vague idea of the definition of engineering often think of mechanics or plumbers as typical engineers. It is important to inform young people about the impact of engineering on society, what engineering encompasses, and how the world as we know it would not exist without engineers.  Illustrating the humanitarian influence of engineering also corresponds with the 2007 Go ENG Girl theme, ‘Engineering, a Caring Profession’.  The applications of each activity should be made obvious to the participants to illustrate the impact of engineering.

Multidisciplinary Nature:  A common misconception in high school is that engineering is only about math and physics.  To break this stereotype, it is critical to illustrate that not only does engineering itself have considerable breadth (ex. chemical, software, architectural), but that many engineering activities involve the integration of other subjects (ex. biology, ecosystems, economics, chemistry, electromagnetism, genetics, ergonomics).  The interest of many senior female high school students appears to lie heavily in health sciences and biology and somewhat in environmental studies (on the basis of personal experience).  Thus, to attract scientifically oriented young females to engineering, it is critical to demonstrate through the Go ENG Girl activities that engineering draws from many disciplines, particularly health sciences and environmental studies.

From a logistics standpoint, it is also important to assess the cost and time involved with each activity and whether it will be suitable for the Go ENG Girl event in terms of the preparation, equipment, and supervision required.  The following thoughts should be considered when selecting the activities:

Cost:  Although the Go ENG Girl budget is about $6-8 per participant (with participants always working in pairs in the past), there has been a surplus of money raised for the event in recent years.  As a result, the amount of money spent on each girl could likely increase to about $20 per girl if needed.  Thus, cost is not a large limiting factor at this point, as long as it within $20 per participant.  However, as two separate activities are usually conducted each year, the difference between the costs of activities should be considered.  For example, some participants may be upset if their project was worth about $5 while the other group took home $20 projects.  Therefore, an effort should be made to develop activities with similar costs.  The issue of cost difference between activities in the same year could potentially be addressed by issuing the more expensive project for all participants that year (ex. both groups could perform the $20 activity).

Time Involved:  The length of time required to complete the activity must be taken into account during planning.  There is about 1.5-2 hours to complete the activity, including the presentation of background materials.  If the activity takes between 2-4 hours for a single person to complete, then it should likely be conducted in pairs, and possibly restricted to the older age group only.  If the activity takes longer than 4 hours for a single person to complete, it could potentially be conducted in groups of 3, but it may be unsuitable for the Go ENG Girl event. 

Preparation:  The time needed for instructors to set up the activity should also be taken into account.  Activities that require excessive preparation (more than 1 or 2 hours total) should be avoided, as could arise, for example, if circuits need to be soldered ahead of time for each individual participant.  Some activities may also require the special order of parts, which could be time consuming and expensive.

Equipment: For both safety reasons and time constraints, the use of extra equipment should be avoided during activities as much as possible.  It is unlikely that circulating participants through a lab in order to use special testing equipment can be adapted to suit the Go ENG Girl event.  The use of dangerous equipment, such as soldering irons, should also be avoided.  In this case, regular soldering irons, which are also expensive, could be replaced with cold soldering irons, or the girls could push circuit components through corrugated cardboard and connect them together with wires on the back.  The equipment should not take more than ½ hour to setup, and preferably, especially if it is expensive, the equipment should be re-usable.  If possible, the use of equipment should be restricted to testing the final projects to avoid unnecessary waiting to complete a stage of the activity.

Available Assistance:  The number of volunteers and the extent of their training should be considered in determining the effectiveness of an activity.  Activities that are highly technical or require significant supervision should be avoided.  For the most part, the girls should be able to completely work through the activity on their own.

Table 1 can be used to help to determine the effectiveness from a designer’s point of view.  Go ENG Girl activities should be given a single point if at least one of the questions beside each quality can be answered ‘yes’, except for qualities followed by an asterisk, which should receive a negative point if answered ‘yes’.  Half-points can be awarded if appropriate.  A greater number of points denotes a more effective activity from a designer’s perspective.

2.2 User Criteria

To obtain an accurate assessment of the effectiveness of the activities, it is important to also consider how the participants will view the final product.  If the activities are uninteresting and irrelevant to the girls’ interests, they will likely not pay attention and miss many of the important points being made about engineering.  Thus, the activities need to be relevant to the girls’ interests.  In addition, the participants should be left with a fully functional product (if applicable) to boost their satisfaction with the activity.

Relevance/Interest:  Many people take for granted everyday necessities that took years to engineer and perfect. From clothes to mattresses to toothpaste to computers, the list of everyday essentials that are designed by engineers is immense.  Many young people do not actually realize how important engineering is, and how it affects almost every aspect of their lives.  To increase awareness of the relevance of engineering to the participants’ everyday lives, it is important that the activities illustrate the engineering behind everyday objects in the participants’ lives.  Common interests of Grade 7-10 girls includes of portable media technology (ex. MP3 players), cellphones, music, television, and movies.  Therefore, some Go ENG Girl activities should be implemented that fall under the themes of Music, Technology, Computers, and Internet.

Final Product:  The activities should also be assessed in terms of the girls’ final impression of the activity.  It is rewarding to take home a functional, final product, so the level of satisfaction with the final project should be considered when evaluating the overall effectiveness of the activity from the user’s perspective.

Table 2 can be used to assess the effectiveness of an activity from the user’s perspective.  A point should be given when at least one question corresponding to each quality can be answered ‘yes’.

3.0 Development of New Go ENG Girl Activities

Method: Activities were brainstormed based on research and previous knowledge of topics that appeal to the targeted age group.  Possible engineering-related activities were generated from each topic and activity feasibility will be determined.  Potential activities were also gathered from pre-existing teaching resources.  The best several activities were developed from scratch and documented to highlight possible problems or areas for improvement.  The effectiveness of the new activities is based on their score determined from the criteria in Sections 1.1 and 1.2.  The effectiveness score and the actual effectiveness can be compared once the activity has been tested and the evaluation feedback from the participants and instructors has been collected.

3.1 Development Progress
To provide a larger selection of activities to choose from, several new Go ENG Girl activities were developed using the assessment criteria outlined in Sections 1.1 and 1.2 as guidelines, and following the methods in Section 2.0.  The activities include a Wind Turbine, Web Browser, Electronic Keyboard, Solar Water Still, and Speakers, as seen in Table 3.  More details on the newly developed activities can be found in Appendices B, C, D, and E.

The pre-existing Go ENG Girl activities, described in Table 4, have also been considered in the evaluation.  The Hydraulic Arm activity has been slightly modified to attract girls interested in Health Sciences.

4.0 Analysis of Go ENG Girl Activities

To objectively compare the activities, each Go ENG Girl activity was scored based on the Designer and User criteria given in Section 1.1 and 1.2 (see Appendix A).  The two scores were also averaged for each activity to give an Average effectiveness score.  Not only does this system suggest the most effective activities (based on the highest average score), but it suggests whether activities are weaker from a designer or user’s perspective.  Activities can then be improved based on their weaknesses, until they reach an acceptable average score.  The minimum acceptable average score was chosen as an 85% average.

4.1 Sample Individual Scoring
The following is an analysis of the Web Browser activity that led to its score in Table 5:
Impact (Score 1, highest): Knowledge is empowerment.  With the
development of durable low-cost laptops, such as the One Laptop Per Child Project [2], information via the Internet is becoming available to children across the globe.  However, without the software to actually connect to the Internet, these machines lose considerable functionality.  Developing staple software for these machines is giving impoverished children the ability to empower themselves using knowledge.

Multidisciplinary Nature (Score 1, highest): Engineering is not always about hardhats and beakers.  Traditional types of engineering, such as mechanical, civil, and chemical, may not appeal to everyone, so it is important to showcase all of the main engineering disciplines.  This activity falls under Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, and Computer Science.

Cost (Score 0, highest):  This activity requires Microsoft Visual Basic 2005 Express, which can be downloaded free of charge.  The only cost incurred by this activity is the labour done to install the software, and the cost of CDs for participants to burn their program onto.

Time Involved (Score 0, highest):  This activity can be completed within the 1-2 hours guidelines.  This activity may be more suitable for the older age group, and if performed with the younger group will likely require participants to work in pairs.

Preparation (Score 0, highest):  The only preparation required for this activity is the installation of the software, and the booking of a computer lab.

Equipment (Score 0, highest):  The activity requires the use of a large computer lab (50-100 students) or two smaller labs.  These can easily be booked ahead of time to avoid conflicts.

Assistance Available (Score 0.5, middle):  This activity may be challenging for instructors who are not comfortable with the Visual Basic programming language.  However, instructors are trained beforehand in the activity, and all engineering students take at least one programming course during their studies.

Relevance/Interest (Score 1, highest):  In all likelihood, all of the girls attending Go ENG Girl are not only computer-proficient, but probably spend almost every moment outside of school on the computer, probably using the Internet.  What better way to introduce participants to computer and software engineering than to have them create something they are interminably familiar with (ie. a web browser), using a high school level programming language? (Microsoft Visual Basic is usually the main programming language taught at high schools.)  During the Web Browser activity, the girls will conduct a ‘virtual’ hands-on activity that will help them to understand the engineering behind a piece of software that they use everyday.

Final Product (Score 1, highest):  The girls will take home their own customized web browser that can be installed on their computers at home and used for years to come.

Other Comments:  The Web Browser activity has the added bonus of targeting computer/software engineering, which consistently has the lowest percentage of female enrollment in engineering at the University of Waterloo.  The activity also highlights engineering and math/programming, which are two of UW’s greatest strengths as a university.

4.2  Comparison and Discussion of Activities
Using the criteria outlined in Sections 1.1 and 1.2, any activity developed for Go ENG Girl can be scored and compared to determine the most effective activities.  The scores for the new and pre-existing activities outlined in Section 2.1 can be seen in Figure 1.


Figure 1: Designer, User, and Average Scores of Go ENG Girl activities

Figure 1 illustrates that the Hydraulic Arm, the Wind Turbine, the Earthquake-Proof Structure, and the Airbag activities scored the highest in terms of Designer Criteria.  Because three of these four activities were pre-existing activities designed by the province for Go ENG Girl, it is not surprising that they scored very well in the Designer Criteria, as they were designed specifically to fit within budget, time, and assistance constraints.  Their low score in the User Criteria can also be explained by their origin.  The pre-existing activities were created with the general intent of promoting engineering among females, and were not specifically targeted for the Grade 7-10 age group.  The Hydraulic Arm activity, which scored the highest of the pre-existing activities on the User Criteria, was given a new context and slightly modified to make it more appealing to the participants, which explains its higher User score.  The lowest Designer scores were the Electronic Keyboard and Speaker, which are challenging because of the equipment required.  For the most part, the activities that received the highest User scores were newly designed.  This is likely due to the fact that the newly designed activities were meant specifically to target Grade 7-10 girls, based on their interests. 

Overall, activities that scored poorly in the User Criteria were pre-existing activities, and projects that scored less well in the Designer Criteria were newly developed.  The best Average scores fell mostly to the newly developed activities, likely because they were designed keeping a balance of Designer and User criteria in mind.  The only activities with the minimum Average score were the Web Browser, the Hydraulic Arm, the Wind Turbine, and the Solar Water Still (Figure 1, Appendix A).  Meanwhile, the Electronic Keyboard, Earthquake-Proof Structure, Airbag, and Speaker need to be re-designed based on their weaknesses in order to be considered effective activities that are suitable for use at Go ENG Girl.
 
5.0  Conclusions

The objective of this report is to determine which activities to use to most effectively promote engineering at the Go ENG Girl event run by the Women in Engineering Committee.  Analysis of the available activities suggests that the only suitable activities that have been analyzed up to this date are:

Hydraulic Arm (Re-designed)
This project achieved an effectiveness score of 88%, and has been successful in previous years of Go ENG Girl.  The re-design of this activity helps it attract girls that are interested in health sciences.

Web Browser
This activity achieved the highest effectiveness score, 93.75%, and will appeal very strongly to the technology and Internet interests of the participants.

Wind Turbine
The Wind Turbine project scored an Average effectiveness of 88%, and appeals to the environmental interests of the participants group.

Solar Still
This activity ranked 88% effective, and is especially suitable for the younger participant group.  It appeals to the environmental interests of the participants.

 6.0  Recommendations

Continued Evaluation of the Assessment Criteria
The effectiveness of the selected activities should be evaluated after the activity using the instructor and participant comments, and the assessment criteria should be re-evaluated using this feedback
(NOTE: Evaluation feedback analysis is not included in this report because the activities still need to be performed and evaluated [the event occurs annually in October].)

Further Analysis of Interests
Data regarding the academic and extracurricular interests of the participant group should be surveyed to determine the most current, relevant topics.  Surveys should also be conducted to investigate the dislikes of the participants group, which could lead to the unearthing of engineering stereotypes within the age group that should be broken.

Continued Development of Activity Options
Another co-op student should be hired at least yearly to develop more activities and improve upon existing activities.  They will ensure that there is an ample database of up-to-date, effective activities that can be rotated for each year of Go ENG Girl to avoid repeats.

References

[1] Waterloo, University of. (2005). Final Report of the Task Force on Women in Engineering (pp.6-7). Retrieved September 1, 2007, from Vision 2010 Strategic Plan.  Web site: http://www.engineering.uwaterloo.ca//Vision2010/reports.html

[2] Negroponte, Nicholas. (2002). One Laptop Per Child.  Retrieved August 31, 2007.  Website: http://www.laptop.org/
 
Appendix A: Individual Analysis Charts for Activities

 
Appendix B: Wind Turbine Details

Basic Concept:
Participants create a wind turbine made of household materials and styrofoam.  The axle connects a motor, which can then be connected to a multimeter to determine power output.

Details, Background & Instruction:
The two main design concepts participants will face in this activity are: (i) creating a supportive base and tower for the wind turbine; (ii) deciding on the number, shape, placement, and material of the blades.  The girls can compare their results by determining the cost per watt generated by their turbine.  Connect the motor to the axle of the turbine and to a multimeter to measure voltage.  The voltage will need to be converted to power.  Divide the cost of the turbine by the power to determine the cost per watt of each participant’s turbine.  The most efficient design wins!

This activity is time-consuming and should be completed in groups of no less than 2.

Themes/Context:
This activity falls under the themes of green energy and sustainability.  The need for renewable energy sources is continually growing, and wind power is becoming more common.

The aim of this activity is expose participants to the ease and effectiveness of renewable energy.  Participants also learn about aerodynamics and energy conversion.  The final product should be able to power a small electrical device, such as a walkman.

Creative Component: Participants experiment with the number, positioning, and shape of the blades, as well as the size and height of the turbine.  All of the participants can design for high winds, or some can design for low wind speeds.
 
Appendix C: Web Browser Details

Basic Concept:
A basic web browser using Mozilla Browser Control with a customizable Graphical User Interface designed in Microsoft Visual Basic Express 2005.

Details, Background & Instruction:
The web browser in this activity is based on the first tutorial in the Microsoft Visual Basic Express 2005 package.  I recommend that activity leaders complete this brief tutorial to gain familiarity with the VB interface. 

This software and license is available free from various sources (see Resources).  VB will need to be installed and registered in a computer lab, and the room will need to be booked for this activity.

After the initial presentation, I would approach this activity by working through the tutorial instructions together.  Here is some extra instruction:
•    After creating a new project and choosing a name (make sure that the project is saved in its own folder), the screen will contain a form called ‘Form1’.  Participants should then open the Toolbox menu on the left side of their screen, and the Properties menu on the right.  Menus will stay in place if they press the push-pin button on the menu (recommended). 
•    First, find Panel in the Toolbox and drag it onto the form.  Participants should position the panel along the top of the screen (if you opened a web browser, this is the panel along the top that holds the buttons and URL box, above where web pages display).  The panel can be docked (under Dock in the Properties menu on the right) to the top, left, and right of the screen (recommended) so that it will automatically re-size when someone re-sizes the form. 
•    The form can also be made larger so that it is easier to work with (however do not make the form unnecessarily big). 
•    Find the Mozilla Browser control (may be named AxMozillaBrowserControl1) and drag it on to the form.  This can be re-sized and docked to fill the rest of the space on the form (this is where web pages will display).
•    Continue following the instructions provided in the VB tutorial. This should provide you with enough framework to understand where things are in VB.
•    You can create a homepage my adding it to the Settings in Edit > [Browser Name] Properties.  It should be inputted as a user-defined string.
•    You can create custom button effects by double-clicking your buttons in the design view.  This will take you into the code view.  Try adding different pictures for when the button is moused over and clicked.  You can take them through one example of doing this and let them complete these actions for the rest of the buttons on their own.
•    One challenge will be the Favourites Menu.  This is an optional addition to the program and still has some bugs that need working out.  I would take the girls through the entire thing step-by-step, letting them anticipate simpler lines.

Because many errors can occur with programming, the entire code for this project will posted on an online forum where the girls can post questions about their code, or get missing pieces of code to complete their browser.

I suggest that participants complete this activity in groups of 1 or 2.

Participants will need to save the entire contents of their folder onto a disc so that they can use their web browser at home.  Because the program creates a .exe file, the web browser can only be run on Windows.

Themes/Context:
This activity falls under the theme of Internet.  Visual Basic, which is typically taught in high school programming courses, is an excellent ‘gateway’ programming language, and this activity will help participants understand how everyday software works using a high level language that closely follows English.

The aim of this activity is introduce participants to the key concepts of programming, an essential engineering skill, in a way that applies to their everyday life.  This activity applies primarily to Software and Computer Engineering, which is a vital facet of engineering that participants encounter in their everyday lives.

Creative Component: Participants will be able to customize the GUI of their browser so that it is user-friendly and accessible.  Participants can also decide which buttons they think are necessary in the browser, as well as which menus they would like to use (ie. Favourites).  Once participants are more familiar with the coding language, they can begin to experiment and create their own functions, which will involve a lot of testing and analysis and what works and what doesn’t.  However, as the participants likely have no previous programming knowledge, most of their experimentation during the activity will revolve around the ‘look’ and user-friendliness of the interface.
 
Appendix D: Electronic Musical Keyboard Details

Basic Concept:
A simple oscillator circuit attached to a set of switches (‘keys’) that uses varying resistances to produce different frequencies.

Details, Background & Instruction:   
The oscillator used in the test circuit was modeled after a circuit acquired from Dr. Mike Fowler (Chemical Engineering).  For testing purposes, the oscillator is connected to speakers with a phone jack, but the phone jack should eventually be replaced with a small, light speaker that can be integrated into the keyboard.  The clip-on for a 9V battery can be replaced with a clip-on for AA batteries if preferred. 

After experimenting with different resistances, I found that Brown-Black-Red resistors in series between the keys produces an audible difference in pitch.  Each resistor is connected to the bottom pad of each key, so that when a key is pressed down, it connects all of the resistors up to that key, which should produce a lower frequency (higher resistance = lower frequency) than the previous key.  The concept is not particularly original and similar designs can be found online, however after looking at many resistor keyboard patents, I haven’t found anything noteworthy. 

I’ve made an initial prototype that demonstrates that the concept works.  The tones produced by the keyboard are somewhat clear if the key is held down, but the main problem with this prototype is that momentary contact with the key produces a scratchy sound with no real pitch.  Therefore, the key contacts need to be re-examined.  My thoughts were to try using a small flat piece of tin of each side of the key rather than aluminum foil; it has also been suggested to try using cloth pins instead of popsicle sticks because the contact surface may be better.  The oscillator circuit may also be improved.  I began experimenting with different values of resistance within the circuit, but haven’t made any real breakthroughs. I recommend asking an Electrical Engineering professor or graduate student if that circuit can be simplified any more.

To avoid soldering in this activity, I recommend creating a digital version of the final circuit diagram, printing it, pasting it onto pieces of corrugated cardboard, and having the participants punch the components through the cardboard and twist it together on the under-side.  Other methods should be investigated as well (ie. cold soldering), but price may be an issue.

I suggest completing this activity in groups of 1 or 2, depending on the age group.

Themes/Context:  
This activity falls under the Music and Technology themes.  Any knowledge of the modern teen market reveals that music is tremendously and universally popular with teenagers.  Furthermore, the popularity of portable music devices, computers, laptops, audio software, speakers, and headphones has made technology inextricably tied to the music market.  This activity draws on the popularity of the music/technology industry with teenagers, which is the targeted audience for this activity.

The aim of this activity is to cause participants to think critically about what goes into everyday electronic music devices by engineering the electrical side of a musical keyboard.  The activity should also give participants a basic background in electrical engineering theory.

Creative Component: While this activity is not entirely out of the development stage, I recommend potentially letting participants experiment with different values of resistors between the keys.  They could also be presented with different options for the key contacts and use the engineering design process to determine which design they would like to use for their keyboard.

 
Appendix E: Solar Water Still Details

Basic Concept:
A simple solar still that uses sunlight to evaporate saltwater, then collects the condensation.

Details, Background & Instruction:
Participants will experiment with types of material and the shape of the still to complete this activity.  Dark materials, like black construction paper, should be provided, as well as reflective materials, such as aluminum foil.  Participants will likely choose to construct either a slanted-top still or a dome-like still.

I would test the stills using boiling water, so that results can be seen immediately.  The still could then be put under a strong light such as a grow lamp (regular light bulbs are ineffective).  The cost of materials can also be incorporated into this event, and if significant ‘pure’ water is produced from the still, participants can measure the cost per litre of water produced by their still.

This activity is fairly simple and should be given only to the younger age group.

Themes/Context:
This activity falls under the themes of green energy and water resources.  There are water shortages around the world, and solar stills are an effective way of utilizing undrinkable sea-water.

The aim of this activity is expose participants to the ease and effectiveness of renewable resources.  Participants also learn about the water cycle and heat transfer.

Creative Component: Participants experiment with the shape of their still, as well as the types of materials used.  Reflective, dark, light, and dull materials should be made available to participants.  I would suggest not stressing the need that the stills be entirely waterproof (ie. they should be allowed to use tape for convenience).