Team:Gaston Day School/Human Practices
Human Practices
Our inspiration came from our secondary advisor who had connections with a local school for students with intellectual disabilities: Webb Street School also located in Gastonia, North Carolina. Due to Covid-19, we were not able to collaborate with them in-person. Instead, we conducted trials with our elementary students, as mentioned above. Our school also has a student with very low-vision and we were able to work with him to test out our new design as well, which proved more successful than the typical graduated cylinder.
As a high school team, we know what it is like working with the best materials and amenities you have available. Yet with these minimalistic tools, we were able to produce extraordinary projects; however, we still experienced lingering difficulties with using our laboratory apparatus. With this dilemma, we proposed a solution through our project itself. Our team realized that other schools also have lower-level equipment, or have students that are not able to access what equipment they have in the lab. We wanted to design new equipment that would be accessible to those with low-vision, no vision, or limited motor control, while still being easy to develop and obtain.
Our team designed the “cuboid:” a different version of a graduated cylinder that is a rectangular prism with accurate measurements. Unlike the classic graduated cylinder, this design has different sized labels making it easier for people with visual challenges, and braille units for those with no vision. In addition, we created a base for our cuboid, which stabilizes it, preventing it from being accidentally knocked over. This helps those with limited motor control be able to handle the cuboid without fear of accidents, and the long handle allows those with limited “grip” muscles to use it. Our Human Practices section partnered with Engineering and the prototype and test-trials were made on a 3D printer. We have our design saved and it is easily shareable with any interested team or school.
To test our prototype, we were able to get in touch with the Lower School Department in Gaston Day School. We were allowed to reach out to younger students of different ages, one group was made of children around three years old and the other group was children around five years old. Due to their limited fine motor skills at such a young age, they were the perfect people to test our design. At the beginning, each of our team members taught two or three children how to use the cuboid. Next, we let the students try out our prototype by filling water inside the cuboids. Then, they poured the water into an electronic balance to measure how precise our design was, making note of our future design improvements. Although the results from the three year-old students were not so accurate due to their limited comprehension of the device’s use and purpose, we did get ideal results from the five year-old students, which proved that our design was functional and precise. During the process, there were teachers nearby so that the younger kids' safety were ensured.
