CanSat Pico-satellite building workshop as an effective tool for STEAM education, a case study

Abstract

In a developed country, for every 2,000 inhabitants there is at least one graduate engineer per year. However, in Paraguay for every 30,000 inhabitants, just one engineer graduates. For a country so lagging behind in the development of infrastructure this relationship is catastrophic. Additionally, the interest on STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) careers has decreased because of the lack of knowledge and the poor performance in subjects related on these areas. According to a PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) test report [1], only 10 % of the Paraguayan student participants have passed the tests on reading, mathematics and science. Space-related educational programs have become a very inspiring way to implement STEM education. One CanSat (Can-Satellite) training program for teachers, that later will perform similar projects with their students, is a very effective tool to motivate students into STEM. During the program, teachers build a very small and simple satellite (a pico-satellite) that has similar functions as larger ones. They learn how to plan, design and solve problems as if they were on a real space mission. The objective of our study is to measure the performance of teachers as they learn how to build CanSats for future projects in order to encourage undergraduate and high school students to get interested in space science. The teacher participants begin by comparing CanSat designs to mission requirements; redesigning the CanSat taking into account the technical knowledge limitations; implementing the new design; launching the CanSats and collect the data, and finally, organizing a training course for students. Impact on learning effectiveness will be measured with indicators like: Experimentation and iteration, Trial and debugging, Reusing and remixing, Abstraction and modularization [2] and will be scored as low, medium or high. In addition, problem-solving competencies based on Polya method [3] [4] will be considered. The process is categorized into four steps: problem comprehension, plan set up, plan execution and obtained solution analysis. All evaluation processes are based on competencies for engineering design.