Benefit to Education
While most of today’s middle school students are knowledgeable on the topic of energy conservation, they still view it as an issue that they cannot do anything about. This program will allow students to not only become more knowledgeable about energy conservation, but allow them to see ways in which they can make a difference in how they impact the situation, not only now, but in the future as homeowners and engineers and architects. By having middle school students take part in this program, it will allow them to see the real-world relevance of what they are learning in their classes. This is a major theme in the National Science Standards, which states the need for students to participate in the “collection of relevant data, the use of logical reasoning, and the application of imagination in devising hypotheses and explanations to make sense of the collected data.” This project will allow students and their families to participate in a project that is arguably the most relevant issue in science today.
Also, in addition to covering a number of the Texas Middle School Science standards (TEKS) they also cover a large number of technology TEKS, which are often pushed to the side in middle school classrooms. A listing of middle school Science TEKS that apply to this program can be found in the Appendix. A complete listing of the middle school technology TEKS can be found at: http://www.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/ch126.html#s12611