Using Scale Models to Promote Technological Literacy

The use of technologies by humans is nothing new. In actuality, humans have utilized technologies of many types since the beginning of time. They extended the capabilities of humans allowing them to accomplish more, do things better, and to some extent make life easier. These technologies were simple and crude by today’s standards, but absolutely essential for life in their point in time. However, modern humans are so wrapped up with today’s gadgets that they have lost touch with and forgotten the early technologies that made it all possible. Since most of them were made of leather, animal tendons, wood, and other items, they have decomposed and been lost over time. Thus leaving only the stone and bone artifacts remaining to be discovered and convey their story. One solution to this unfortunate dilemma is to rebuild them. Recreating the small relics using the original tools and methods is relatively easy but larger items make the task far more difficult. The sheer size of many of these items makes the job extremely challenging, problematic, and undoable. That is where the use of scale models comes in. Exact replicas of large objects can be fabricated at a scaled down size to demonstrate how they were originally constructed and used. Two years ago a project was undertaken to do exactly that. Beginning with one scale model, the project was so successful and well received that it was quickly expanded to include other technologies and machines. These scale models average about three feet in length making them suitable for use in classroom demonstrations. They are extremely mobile and transported on specially designed Educational Delivery Vehicles (EDVs). They bring the past back to life and give today’s students a realistic look at ancient technologies in a way that is superior to pictures and textual descriptions. The objective is to enhance the student’s understanding of how and why past technologies were developed and used. This paper reviews the scale model project discussing what artifact was first reconstructed, how it was made, and looks into the future to relics that can also be built as scale models to promote technological literacy.