2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

We have traditionally designed hands-on activities to engage middle-school students in summer workshops where they can work in teams and access a wide array of tools and materials. We created and improved integrated art and engineering activity for two years, inventing a laser-cut cardboard box that the participants can transform into a portable shadow puppet theater that contains 2D pre-cut geometric shapes to make puppets. As part of the add-ons, each child assembles and codes a LED circuit to produce lightning effects according to a story they invent. Children learn about engineering design and the arts in three days.
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Grade level
Middle-school kids

Time
3 sessions

Activity Overview
In this activity, the participants will learn how to identify and blend concepts and skills from the neurosciences, engineering, theater production, new media arts, and geometry to produce a more integrated understanding of knowledge that promotes and protects human rights and fundamental freedoms. The learning setting is a shadow puppetry production, and the participants will have the role of entertainment engineers and producers. The activity begins with a letter from the client, the Lincoln Center Theater. The letter states the problem and asks “engineers” to solve it. This problem is related to creating a prototype of a shadow puppetry performance. Before beginning their designs, the Center requires that children complete a set of warm-up activities to explore the materials and learn some concepts from the sciences, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics they will use to construct a prototype, a testable model, of their performance. After the participants learn how the pieces work together, they will receive a second letter from the client that provides them with additional information to consider when designing their shadow puppetry performance prototype. Participants should think of multiple factors involved in the problem, select which ones they would like to explore more, construct a model, test it, make any necessary changes based on their observations, and then send back a message to the client describing their prototype and why they think their idea is a good solution.

Materials
• Scenario
o Cardboard box (9x12x2.5 in)
o A4 vellum translucent paper
o Blue painters tape
o Carbon paper (only if the user does not have a laser cutter)
o Cardboard cutter (only if the user does not have a laser cutter)
• Lighting
o Arduino
o LED strip
• Puppets
o Construction paper
o 6 mm metal brads paper fasteners
o Wooden stir sticks (7x1/4 in)
o Invisible tape
o Foam
o Sharp pin
o Blunt tip scissors
• Background
o A4 green-colored transparency
o A4 blue-colored transparency
o A4 red-colored transparency
o A4 uncolored transparency
o Medium binder clips
o Fine point permanent marker – Black
• Storytelling
o A4 white paper
o Pencil
o Ruler
• Equipment
o Laptop
NOTE: Multiply each material according to the number of kits you want to construct. According to the learning objectives and intentions, it could be used for one or multiple people.

Set-Up
• Box
o Option 1: Without a laser cutter
 Print out the template of the screen with the geometric figures (Appendix 1) in A4 format
 Copy the template with carbon paper on the top of the box
• Option 2: With a laser cutter
 Use the following Corel Draw file to print the frame and geometric figures on the top of the box
 For a laser cutter XXXXXXX, use the following parameters: Vector, 12 horizontal, 9 vertical,
• Print out the Letter 1 (Appendix 2). Consider printing out as many letters as boxes you will set up.
• Take one unit of each material and a printer Letter 1, and put it inside the box, previously to bring the whole kit to the participants

Learning Objectives
General
Identify and blend concepts and skills from the neurosciences, engineering, theater production, new media arts, and geometry to produce a more integrated understanding of knowledge that promotes and protects human rights and fundamental freedoms.

Specific
1. Recognize and use the visual perception, optics, and geometry principles that are useful in shadow puppetry
2. Explore and use LED and programming, as new art media, to produce timed colored lights for shadow puppetry production
3. Apply the engineering design process to solve problems related to shadow puppetry production
4. Create meaningful stories related to the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms
5. Select, analyze and interpret a shadow puppetry piece as a sample presentation

Connection with American educational standards
MS-ETS1-1 Define the criteria and constraints of a design problem with sufficient precision to ensure a successful solution, taking into account relevant scientific principles and potential impacts on people and the natural environment that may limit possible solutions.
MS-ETS1-2 Evaluate competing design solutions using a systematic process to determine how well they meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.
MS-PS4-2 Develop and use a model to describe that waves are reflected, absorbed, or transmitted through various materials.
MS-LS1-8 Gather, read, and synthesize information that sensory receptors respond to stimuli by sending messages to the brain for immediate behavior or storage as memories.
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.7.G.B.6 Solve real-world and mathematical problems involving area, volume and surface area of two- and three-dimensional objects composed of triangles, quadrilaterals, polygons, cubes, and right prisms.
TH:Re9.1.7b Apply the production elements used in a drama/theatre work to assess aesthetic choices.
VA:Cr1.2.7a Develop criteria to guide making a work of art or design to meet an identified goal.
VA:Cr2.3.7a Apply visual organizational strategies to design and produce a work of art, design, or media that clearly communicates information or ideas.
VA:Pr5.1.7a Based on criteria, analyze and evaluate methods for preparing and presenting art.
VA:Re.7.2.7a Analyze multiple ways that images influence specific audiences.

Engineering design process

Source: Moore, T. & Douglas, K. A. (2016). EngrTEAMS. EngrTEAMS: Engineering to transform the education of analysis, measurement, and science in a team-based targeted mathematics-science partnership.

Step Question to solve in each step
Define Who is the client? What is the problem to solve? Why is it important to solve? Who are the end-users?
Learn What concepts and skills are essential to know to solve the problem?
Plan How can I use these concepts and skills to solve the problem? Which other are necessary?
Try Put the plan into action
Test Consider testable questions, collect data and analyze it
Decide How could your design be improved based on your test results and feedback from the client/user? Does your design meet the criteria and stay within the constraints?
Communicate Good oral and written communication

Instructional guide
This tutorial is based on the engineering design process previously defined. Each step of the process presents one or more activities.

Initial notes
1. This activity can be done individually or by teams (children, children-adults, adults).
2. Adults are encouraged to let the children lead the activity while they help facilitate the activity. To help ease this process, define who leads each part of the project.
3. Keep in mind that some activities require more time to be done according to the participants’ level of detail and skills development.

Define
4. Take the letter of the client and the engineering design process booklet.
5. While reading this letter, answer the questions in the booklet regarding the problem, who need it to be solved, and why it is essential to solving.
6. Construct the scenario to make sense of the constraints of the project.
• Empty the box. It will be the shadow puppetry scenario.
• For the version without a laser cutter, use the cardboard cutter (preferably handled by an adult) to create the frame of the scenario and the geometric figures, following the lines previously copied with the carbon paper on the top of the box. For the laser cutter version, simply push the perforated lines on the cardboard for both the screen and the geometric figures. In both cases, save the geometric figures for the next steps.

Learn
1. Screen built up
• Take the translucent vellum paper and locate it in the frame left by the piece of removed cardboard from the top of the box
• Use the blue painter tape to paste the vellum paper to the paper, avoiding that the tape will be visible from the other side when the screen is illuminated with an artificial light (LED light, torch, etc.)
2. Puppets construction
• Take the geometric figures that you extracted from the cardboard box.
• Follow this link and learn how silhouettes are constructed based on basic geometric figures (2D geons).
• Once learned about silhouette construction, combine the cardboard geometric figures as preferred to create a puppet. Each figure will be a part of this character. Use as many figures as you want, but use the construction paper to make more if you need them (i.e., more triangles).
• Decide where the figures join and draw a point on each figure with the pencil. This point will hold them together.
• Using the sharp pin, make a hole in these points over the piece of foam and hold them together with the fasteners. Make it as many parts as you consider your puppet has.
• Hold the constructed puppet over a sheet of paper and draw its silhouette with the pencil to see what it looks like. If you want to make any change, loose each part and redo the previous steps (optional).
• Once the finalized puppet is done, paste with transparent tape in each mobile part a wooden stirrer. Use at least two stirrers according to the movements you want to generate for the puppet.
• Answer in the booklet the questions related to puppets construction.
Note: If individually, make more characters as you prefer. If in teams, each member of the team can make their own. Besides, you can use other papers to make your characters (i.e., colored transparencies, tissue paper, etc.).
3. Lightning production
• Follow this link and learn about how the characteristics of color.
• Cut 10 in of the LED strip.
• Arduino process.
• Answer in the booklet the questions related to lightning construction.

Plan
1. Watch the following video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpWHZJZQDSE
2. Take one A4 sheet of paper and divide it into six boxes. Number them from 1 to 6.
3. Write in the first box the character or characters created in the previous steps and the new characters you want to introduce (who), their characteristics (what), the setting they see (where), and their location in time (when).
4. Use boxes 2 to 5 to draw each of the central moments of the story (Introduction, Rising Action, Climax, Falling Action, and Resolution). This story should take up to 5 min.

Try
1. Modify the previous puppets or create new ones according to the previous ones.
2. Identify what light colors you want to use in each moment of the story and program them to appear, depending on when the moment of the story happens.
3. Create the backgrounds you desire to set, drawing on the colored or uncolored transparencies with the marker, according to your preference, the sensations you want to provoke, and the colors of the lightning you chose. Each background will be placed in front of the lights and supported on the binder clips.

Test
1. Write in the booklet the expectations you have regarding the prototype you created.
2. Rehearse your story with all the elements and effects that you created.
3. Present your performance to the audience you prefer or intend.
4. Collect the data that will help you make decisions and changes in your prototype.

Decide
1. Answer in the booklet the questions related to lightning construction. What did work? What would you change?
2. Make the changes you consider will improve your performance and the experience of your audience
3. Answer in the booklet the questions related to the change you made. What did you change?

Communicate
Go to the booklet and use the template to send back a message to the client describing the prototype you created, explaining why you think your idea is a good solution, and the learnings you obtained.