Unit 1 — Lab Safety/What is Engineering?
Description
This unit introduces students to workplace safety practices and the fundamentals of engineering as a discipline. Students identify and apply safe practices required in professional work settings and demonstrate proper use of hand and power tools in the lab environment. The unit covers what engineering is, how it fits within STEM and STEAM education, and how engineers have contributed to major technological developments. Students research and explore the eight main engineering disciplines with emphasis on civil engineering, understanding the prototypes and designs involved in this specialty. Through class discussion, internet research, and digital presentations, students learn why different engineering disciplines are needed in modern society and how they positively impact communities.
Essential Questions
- What safety precautions are critical to follow in the engineering lab?
- What is the function and use of tools in the lab?
- What is engineering and how does it fit into STEM education?
- What are the different disciplines of engineering and why is civil engineering a focus of this course?
Learning Objectives
- Identify and apply safe practices as required in the world of work.
- Demonstrate proper and safe use of hand and power tools used in the lab.
- Explain the meaning of engineering and how it fits into STEM and STEAM education.
- Explain how engineers have contributed to the development of major technologies.
- Explain the importance of differing engineering disciplines and how they have positively impacted society.
- Understand what civil engineering is and what types of prototypes and designs are involved in this specialty.
Suggested Texts
- What is Engineering? — informational
- Engineering Safety and Engineering Ethics resources — instructional video
Supplemental Resources
- Construction paper for design activity
- Tin foil for design activity
- Pennies for design activity
- Markers for research presentations
- Chart paper for displaying design process information
Engineering Design
Interaction of Technology and Humans
Engineering, Technology, and Applications of Science
Standards for Mathematical Practice
Students engage in collaborative discussions with diverse partners, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly while working through design challenges and presenting their engineering findings.
Students apply mathematical practices including making sense of problems and persevering in solving them, reasoning abstractly and quantitatively, constructing viable arguments, modeling with mathematics, using appropriate tools strategically, and attending to precision while designing and testing structures.
Students apply the engineering design process to define criteria and constraints, evaluate competing solutions, analyze test data, and develop models for iterative testing while following multistep procedures and safety protocols.
Formative Assessments
- Class discussion on engineering and engineering as a profession.
- Design activity: solve a teacher-assigned challenge such as building the longest line from one piece of construction paper or creating a foil boat that holds the most pennies.
- Internet research of historical engineering achievements across the eight main engineering disciplines.
- EdPuzzle videos on engineering safety and engineering ethics.
Summative Assessment
Google Slides presentation where students develop and present information about an engineering discipline they researched, explaining why that discipline is important to modern society.
Benchmark Assessment
— not configured —
Alternative Assessment
Students may demonstrate understanding of lab safety and engineering disciplines through a combination of oral responses to teacher questions, labeled diagrams with visual supports, or a recorded video explanation in place of a written or digital presentation. Checklists and sentence frames may be provided to support organization of ideas.
IEP (Individualized Education Program)
Students may benefit from pre-taught vocabulary related to engineering disciplines and lab safety before engaging in research or discussion tasks. Providing graphic organizers or visual frameworks to help organize information gathered during internet research can support both comprehension and output during the presentation component. For the design activity and tool demonstrations, breaking multi-step procedures into numbered, sequential steps with visual aids will help students process and follow directions independently. Oral or recorded responses may serve as alternatives to written components of the presentation, and extended time should be provided for both research and the final product.
Section 504
Students should be given extended time for the research process and the development of their digital presentation. Preferential seating near the demonstration area during tool safety instruction will support focus and access to visual modeling. Directions for multi-part tasks, such as the design challenge or research assignment, should be provided in both written and verbal formats to reduce processing barriers.
ELL / MLL
Visual supports such as labeled diagrams of engineering disciplines, illustrated lab safety rules, and picture-supported reference materials will help students access the content more independently. Key vocabulary related to engineering, safety practices, and STEM concepts should be introduced with visual context before research or discussion tasks begin, and students should be encouraged to use bilingual resources or home language references when exploring unfamiliar engineering terminology. Simplified sentence frames can support participation in class discussion and scaffold the structure of the digital presentation.
At Risk (RTI)
Connecting engineering concepts to familiar real-world structures and technologies in students' communities can help build relevance and entry points into the content. For the research component, providing a structured guide with focused questions can reduce overwhelm and help students identify key information across engineering disciplines. The design activity offers a natural, low-stakes opportunity for hands-on engagement, and pairing students strategically during collaborative portions can support confidence and participation without removing independence.
Gifted & Talented
Students who quickly grasp the foundational concepts of engineering disciplines can be encouraged to explore the intersections between multiple disciplines — for example, examining how civil and environmental engineering overlap in addressing infrastructure challenges. For the research and presentation component, students may investigate a controversial or emerging engineering project and analyze its societal trade-offs using an engineering ethics lens. Extending the civil engineering focus, students might explore how modern prototyping tools such as CAD software or computational modeling are changing how engineers design solutions, connecting historical achievements to future innovation.