Design Of An Inexpensive Optics Demonstration/Experimentation Kit For Middle School

An inexpensive and user-friendly optics kit has been designed and a working prototype built for middle-school teachers for demonstration and for middle-school students for experimentation in light reflection, refraction, absorption, and transmission. The end product integrates the disciplines of industrial design, engineering, engineering technology, and business, and it demonstrates the iterative processes of engineering design and product development. It is also the sum of the creative efforts of first-year engineering students, senior Industrial Design students, junior business students, and senior industrial and manufacturing students. Finally, this project is an example of the products and services of the Engineering Design Center for ServiceLearning located at Western Michigan University to enhance K-12 mathematics and science teaching and learning.