The effectiveness of the introduction of an educational module to an Introduction to Engineering class was investigated. A lecture introducing nanotechnology was given to the students, and the students participated in a question-and-answer period following the lecture. The “Nanotechnology Awareness Instrument” of Dyehouse et al.1 was used to assess students' motivation for, awareness of, and exposure to nanotechnology. The survey contained thirty multiple choice questions divided into sections covering nanotechnology awareness, motivation, and exposure. The survey was given to the students prior to the lecture and again five weeks after the lecture. An Ordinal Pattern Analysis in Observation Oriented Modeling was used to evaluate differences in student scores on the Nanotechnology Awareness Instrument after the lecture as compared to their scores before the lecture. It was found that students’ awareness and exposure increased after the lecture however their motivation did not increase.
Xiaoliang Jin received his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of British Columbia, Canada, in 2012. Now he is an Assistant Professor at Oklahoma State University, USA. His research interests include precision manufacturing processes, mechanics and dynamics of micro-machining, vibration assisted machining, and precision control.
http://orcid.org/https://0000-0001-8553-4658
Texas A&M University
[biography]
Prabhakar Reddy Pagilla is the James J. Cain Professor II in the J. Mike Walker '66 Department of Mechanical Engineering at Texas A&M University. He received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 1996. His formal
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