Literacy Beat

• The Literacy in the Disciplines Interview Project

Cynthia H. Brock interviewed Cal Anderson of SpaceX and Joe Assof of Health Sciences High and Middle College about the intersections of literacy, mechanical engineering, and mathematics in this video series.

In Part I, Cindy, Cal, and Joe discuss some of the expectations and demands of language in the mechanical engineering field.

In Part II, the team converses about how the ideas they discussed in Part I might look in the classroom. At two points in the conversation, Joe provided video of his students in the classrooms.  Look for the callout to take you to the classroom videos or view them separately, below.

In this video, Joe Assof works through a complex problem with a group of 11th graders where they have to understand the context of the problem and what is being asked in order to understand how to apply the mathematics. Notice how the students use language to support their understanding in mathematics.

Joe is working with an outstanding group of students who use close-reading to understand two short word problems in this video. The students are using an annotation scaffold to guide their thinking as they read and discuss the word problems.

Next, W. Ian O’Bryne, College of Charleston, interviews Kurt Becker, Utah State University, about intersections of engineering education, design, STEM, and literacy.

You may also access this set of videos in the Interview Series that have to do with STEM topics as a playlist on YouTube.

Soon, I will have these interviews uploaded as podcasts to iTunes or GooglePlay, so stay tuned!

Filed under: disciplinary literacy | Tagged: Anderson, Assof, Brock, engineering, interview, literacy, mathematics, SpaceX, Wolsey |