Innovative First Year Aerospace Design Course at MIT
Innovative First Year Aerospace Design Course at MIT
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麻省理工学院创新的第一年航空航天设计课程
DOI：
10.1002/j.2168-9830.2001.tb00616.x
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发表时间：
2001
影响因子：
3.4
通讯作者：
Amir R. Amir
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
D. Newman;Amir R. Amir
麻省理工学院的学生通常从第二年开始学习专业特定的课程。对于渴望开始航空航天教育的第一年学生，为了帮助那些不确定选择航空航天工程作为其专业领域的学生，麻省理工学院航空航天系提供了一门选修课，航空航天与设计概论。该课程利用万维网提供的新机会，并通过动手，比空气轻（LTA）车辆设计项目为学生提供真实的工程经验。本课程教授航空学的基本概念，包括设计讲座，并给出了航空学的概述。万维网固有的灵活性使我们能够满足学生的需求，他们需要对基础知识进行回顾，除了课堂上的讲座材料，以及其他希望学习高级材料的学生的需求。一个基于网络的讨论论坛极大地促进了学生之间的互动，从而产生了更好的车辆设计和更友好的课堂环境。该课程的高潮是LTA车辆设计竞赛，其中五到六名学生组成的团队设计和建造长度可达5米的无线电控制飞艇。飞行器围绕篮球场的周边飞行，目的是在最短的时间内携带最大量的有效载荷。学生通过在教师评审团面前口头介绍他们的初步设计和关键设计，了解真实的工程实践。在课程结束时，学生需要提交一份设计作品集，展示他们的LTA车辆是如何通过个人和团队的努力形成的。学生们被允许检查以前的设计，并对其进行改进，每年都能生产出更好的车辆。一项调查的结果表明，大一新生在没有明确答案的技术问题上工作，以及用各种给定的部件设计和制造设备时，感觉更舒服。
Students at MIT typically take major‐specific courses beginning with their second year of studies. For the first year students eager to begin their aerospace education and to help those students unsure about selecting aerospace engineering as their major field, the MIT Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics offers an elective course, Introduction to Aerospace and Design. The course makes use of the new opportunities offered by the World Wide Web and provides students a real engineering experience through the hands‐on, Lighter‐Than‐Air (LTA) vehicle design project. The course teaches the basic concepts of aeronautics, includes lectures on design, and gives an overview of astronautics. The flexibility inherent in the World Wide Web allows us to accommodate the needs of students who require a review of the fundamentals in addition to in‐ class lecture material and the needs of others who desire to learn advanced material beyond what is presented in lecture. A Web‐based Discussion Forum greatly facilitated interaction among students, resulting in better vehicle designs and a friendlier classroom environment. The course culminates in an LTA vehicle design competition in which teams of five to six students design and build radio‐controlled blimps measuring up to 5 meters in length. The vehicles are flown around the perimeter of a basketball court with the objective of carrying a maximum amount of payload in a minimum amount of time. The students are introduced to real‐world engineering practice through oral presentations of their preliminary designs and critical designs in front of a faculty jury. Towards the end of the course, the students are required to submit a design portfolio showing how their LTA vehicles took shape via their individual and team efforts. The students are permitted to examine previous designs and improve upon them, yielding better vehicles every year. Results from a survey indicated that the freshmen felt much more comfortable working on technical problems with no clear answers as well as designing and building a device from an assortment of given parts.