High school students enlightened with engineering perspective on equations
Two classes from Sønderborg Statsskole switched their class room with a lecture hall at Alsion and received their math lessons at SDU – seasoned with a special engineering perspective.
During the month of August, two math classes from senior year at Sønderborg Statsskole have on three occasions switched their class room with a lecture hall at SDU in Alsion. Here, they received their math lessons but with an extra perspective. Associate Professor Benny Lassen from the Mads Clausen Institute, SDU, joined in at the end of each lesson with several examples of how engineers work with math.
Differential equations and bridge collapse.
The overall theme for the three math lessons was differential equations. Teachers from Sønderborg Statsskole managed the teaching of the high school students’ curriculum, after which Associate Professor Benny Lassen joined in. Among other things, he focused on Newton’s second law and how it is applied in propulsion of rockets, resonance in mechanical systems and it’s relation to the Tacoma Narrow bridge collapse in 1940 (bridge in the state of Washington, USA). Further, Benny Lassen presented his own research in deformable surfaces and how diffential equations are central to this research.
Teacher Ingo Struve, who had arranged the lessons with the MCI, says that the high school students liked the lessons. The engineering aspects were particularly interesting for those with high-level Physics in their field of study.
- The visit at SDU has given the high school students the possibility of experiencing how it will be when they go on to study at a university. They have seen that math not only is something taking place at school but that it’s something many of them will use in their future careers, says Ingo Struve.
See more pictures from Statsskolen’s visit at MCI on the Facebook page for the engineering study program Mechatronics.