Week 3 Day 2 - April 23rd
Topics:
Online Courses
Online Courses are an affordable or free way for students all over the world to access knowledge and accreditation from world class universities such as MIT, Stanford, & Berkley as well as receive specialized trainings in programming and software packages.
Setting up an online course account
As you will see, there are multiple providers of online courses, as the universities themselves do not host their own courses. You may need to create multiple accounts if you are taking multiple classes. When you do, make sure to use a consistant username and the same email address to help keep track of your login info.
Most importantly, if you are making many passwords record your passwords and their account associations somewhere you can find them (on the inside of your folder, for example). If you lose access to your account, you will lose all associated progress as well.
Below are some Online Course Resources:
- Class Central An search platform for finding courses across different websites.
- Coursera
Features college-level short and full length classes (College certification available)
- Example Course: Design Thinking for the Social Sector
- Edx
Features college-level short and full length classes (College certification available)
- Example Course: Social Media: How media got social
- Khan Academy
High School and college-level topic-specific courses (great for beefing up on a specific topic, ex: calculating area and volume, fractions, etc.)
- Example Course: Algebra Basics
- FutureLearn
Features a range of short and long form topic courses
- Example Course: Writing Applications
- Lynda
Software/topic specific courses - free with pcc email
- Example Course: Fusion 360 Essential Trainings
- Udacity
Challenging Tech and Business Oriented Courses
- Example Course: How to Build a Startup
Project Exploration
Up until now, students have been allowed to borrow designs and models from other creators in order to become familar with fabrication tools. Now that students have some familiarity with the tools, they will be expected to create their own designs and models to build something truely unique(an not copyright infringing).
It can be difficult to come up with an original idea from scratch, so today we are going to explore potential project topics through a general discussion of interests, tools, and applications and learn to ask the right questions to spur original solutions.
Task 1:
A lot of projects and inventions come out of either a passion for a specific field or a personal observation of need or technology gap in everyday life.
- Make a list of interests & jobs or
- Make a list of challenges or problems you see in the world or in everyday life
Task 2:
-
Brainstorm sub topics or subproblems related to your interest area
-
Pick a few interesting topics and problems and begin researching
-
Google your topic generally and try to pick out other terms related to your topic, building a vocabulary about your topic is important to finding existing work and understanding the context of your interest/problem. (ex. If you are interested in global warming, what are the key terms related to global warming and what institutions and disciplines are researching and influencing this topic?)
-
Research current solutions and tools related to your interest (ex. If you are worried about global warming, what are some current solutions that people are applying or proposing? What kind of tools are they using to solve that problem? Ex. Carbon Capture, Alternative Energy Sources, Environmental Policy, etc.)
-