(262b) A 21st Century Textbook for Material and Energy Balances

A 21st Century Textbook for Material and Energy Balances
Textbooks are a 20th century technology ready for a 21st century makeover. The utility of the textbook has diminished for higher education students, i.e., digital natives. The concept behind this new book is to have students interact with the â??textbookâ??. Almost all textbooks focus on the lowest levels of Bloomâ??s taxonomy, namely remembering and understanding. However, especially in engineering programs, higher levels skills of applying and analyzing are requisite to earn an accredited undergraduate degree. The Scaffolded Tool for Active Reading(STAR) © is a new online only format for delivery engineering course material. I foresee the STAR format to
be used by the students while the traditional textbooks will become a reference manual and teacherâ??s guide. The first STAR textbook was beta tested during the Spring 2014 semester for a material and energy balances class enrolling over 150 students. This talk will demonstrate interesting features of the â??bookâ? as well as survey data on the students usage and evaluation of the new delivery method.