Tag / Bolton Street

by shannonchance

RoboSlam–Extended Version

Yesterday the students who built robots with the crew coordinated by Drs. Ted Burke and Damon Berry headed over to DIT’s Bolton Street location to learn about mechanical, industrial, and product design. Thanks to Kevin Delaney, Ger Reilly, Susan O’Shaughnessy and crew for a fascinating day! I’ll be posting lots more photos of RoboSlam in the days to come.  It’s been such fun!

Refining the electronics…
…and tweaking placement of the sensors.
Creating bodies…
…and making sure they fit the chassis and electronic components.

by shannonchance

Focus on the Student

All these students voluntarily attended two back-to-back lectures last night–isn’t that amazing?

The Architecture Student Association got a great turn out for its symposium on the architecture student last night!  I’ve posted a photo of the crowd that made it all the way to the end of the two lectures… pretty amazing.  They came straight out of a day of classes into the lecture hall!

Maxim Laroussi of Architecture Republic talked about growing up in Morocco as well as what he learned about architecture by living in France, England, Scotland, Brazil, and Ireland.  Very interesting indeed!

Then I talked about “Learning Together” and how we can/should improve the way we teach architecture.  The main idea is that we need to focus more on understanding how students learn rather than on what content teachers deliver (i.e., what they say in class).

The speakers and organizers for last night’s ASA symposium: Andrew Ó Murchú, Shannon Chance, Colin Mac Suibhne, and Maxim Laroussi.

by shannonchance

Working, Actually

Multi-use space under the coffee dock.

I haven’t been posting much about the work I’m doing (my readership statistics plummet when I do!!?!).  Nevertheless, I have been working!

Yesterday, I spent the morning transcribing and completing my reading of the methods chapters from several different dissertations.

I met Gavin outside the “coffee dock”  to discuss our projects over packed lunches.  The whole place was very crowded so we found a seat in the area of the cafeteria reserved for teachers.

Lunch with Gavin.

Most of DIT’s buildings with classrooms have a cafeteria, as well as a coffee kiosk (which they call a coffee dock), and other places to hang out or eat a packed lunch.  I’m including of a gathering/eating/meeting space in the engineering building on Bolton Street.  In this picture, I’m looking down from the coffee dock to a multi-use sort of space filled with students.

I love these types of in-between spaces that encourage social interaction… you’ll find them in all of the school buildings designed by the Dutch architects Herman Hertzberger, for instance.

After lunch, Gavin and I headed to a three-hour meeting of the Educational Research Group for the College of Engineering and the Built Environment.  We spent several hours discussing similarities and differences between phenomenology and phenomenography.  Let me know if you want me to Skype you in for our next session!    😉

Three of our six seminar participants — Gavin, Eric, and Sima.

Watching Brian Bowe, Head of Learning Development, bring phenomenography to life!