UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN IOWA

June 26, 2000

Dear Seibun,

Let me introduce myself to you. I have spent nearly thirty years of my life assisting school systems in science curriculum reform. The past twenty years I have also been involved in curriculum development, especially for middle school to senior high school physical science and physics. We are currently funded by the National Science Foundation to enhance our previously developed Physics Resources and Instructional Strategies for Motivating Students (PRISMS) curriculum for middle school through senior high school physics and physical science classes.

Our approach is very consistent with the teaching methods suggested by the National Science Education Standards (NSES) and the National Research Council. The teaching strategy that we utilize is to provide the students with an exploratory activity in which the students are presented with phenomena and are asked to find patterns and relationships as they make observations. Based on this experience students are then assisted to construct their own understanding, which is consistent with the scientific interpretations of phenomena. After the concept has been formulated, then the students are presented with an additional application activity to give them an experience in observing a different phenomenon to see whether they can use their newly learned concept to interpret other phenomena. The more phenomena they can interpret correctly, the more powerful the concept becomes.

I have inspected rather carefully the three types of model cars you demonstrated for me and which you allowed me to field test with some of our teachers. I am impressed that the cars have imbedded in their design many significant concepts that can be taught by their use by a broad range of students. Introductory concepts regarding electric circuits and magnetism may be taught to middle school students. We see a great potential for these cars to also be used at the secondary school level to teach more advanced concepts on electromagnetic theory, motors and generators. The NSES also stress that inquiry learning should be a part of all science curricula. These cars have tremendous potential for investigating a host of relationships between identified independent and dependent variables. Students can then create their own design and data collection techniques and write up appropriate conclusions to their study.

Over two thousand secondary physics and physical science teachers have taken training in the PRISMS Project during the past 18 years. Many of these schools served are in school districts where finances for finding student centered interactive learning are a problem. We would be extremely grateful if we could learn of business in America that would be willing to find support of the use of some outstanding learning by the use of your solar, wind and electric powered cars. I would appreciate hearing from you if such companies exist.

Thank you very much for your consideration and I congratulate you for your contribution to science education in America.

Sincerely
Roy D. Unruh, Director
PRISMS Project
University of Northern Iowa

Back