Compliance

From late January to mid-February, the Air team was in the initial planning stages of their project, and likewise in the initial stages of understanding “documentation” as a required aspect of their grade. Documentation in this stage largely followed recent prompts, such as graded documentation assignments or suggestions from adults that they take a photo. Students were often unsure of the value of documentation, when to create it, and missed opportunities to use it; Billie, for example, remarked, “I just wish instead of (non-consecutive days) we could do it on like, a Tuesday and a Wednesday so we wouldn’t forget what we did” (emphasis added). In this stage, students used practices they were likely familiar with from other groupwork and tasks:

• Divide work on written documents, such as color coding their PDR document • Making written shopping lists

• Taking notes in Google Docs • Taking indiscriminate photos

With expectations that the team fundraise, document their project, and research and order parts to build a quadcopter, the team spent a lot of time talking about bake sales until their teacher distributed the first documentation rubric on February 5th. “Early on self-reflection point. Not a major grade, not meant to harm you, but to give you future instruction.” The rubric stated that to get the maximum of ten points, students would have to show “the evolution of team ideas/build via ideas, analysis, pictures, video, sketches, models, resources through entire process.”

Up to now, the team had only been saving links for parts they might order and jotting down names of people they might ask to sponsor their team. London immediately told Mr. Mancina that the team didn’t have pictures or videos. “Would you have a lot at this stage of the game?” he replied. The team scrambled to assemble pictures of some kind. London volunteered to “draw it

out.” Samantha and Billie worked together to describe their process in Google Docs, the formal platform for documentation in the class (example in Figure 9, see next page). Their initial documentation restated the requirements of the project, which they had been asked to do in class, but included almost no information about their design ideas, thought process on what parts to include, or other information that would be useful to advancing their design process.

Figure 9 The team’s initial documentation in Google Docs, with box added to highlight information about the team’s progress.

The following class session, the team received an email from their teacher saying that they had received only 7/10 on documentation. Amid frustration and outrage at the impact this would have on their physics grade and confusion that their work was insufficient (Billie, in particular, said, “We included a picture of the drone and still only got a seven out of ten on documentation?”), Samantha the documenter read Mr. Mancina’s feedback to the group; “Each time you meet you should have a good representation of your work documented by date. This includes pictures, videos, and links to your thinking process and ideas. What you have currently is limited but I am confident that after our discussions you have good understanding of the expectations.” Billie reflected to the team, “I don’t know, even if we got a bad grade I’m proud of us on our documentation, even though we didn’t have a lot of pictures, I think it’s pretty and detailed.” She also said they should ask for more feedback “Because I would like to not get a C next time...”

The Preliminary Design review formed the next major documentation checkpoint for the team. Over several class sessions, the Air team studied the Preliminary Design Review rubric and found a sample from a previous year’s land team of a PDR to follow like a template. The team was shocked and upset to see that the requirements for documentation were even more detailed than they had interpreted from their teacher’s rubric. Several members of the team expressed that they felt the PDR was hopeless and impossible, and reflected that they did not have a lot of the information and documentation necessary for all the parts of the very long writeup (one student estimated about 20 pages). “Our prices are supposed to be in a chart?” Billie exclaimed, examining the document. “We’ve ordered one thing!” Eliot asked the group if anyone knew they had to keep a daily log; they all say no, despite earlier feedback from their teacher about this requirement. They read through the rubric and sample several times over several sessions as a team before they

understood the depth of what the PDR was asking for, for example a daily log of all activities throughout the entire course of the project.

Instead of relying solely upon the documenter to fill in the gaps, the team color coded sections they planned to work on to divide and conquer, quickly putting together whatever information they had scattered across Amazon shopping carts, Google Docs, browser tabs, and memory into the format the PDR requested. At the first author’s suggestion, Billie and Samantha used a whiteboard in the room to draw their drone design. Samantha initially asked, “Should I be drawing all together what it is going to look like?” Billie took the lead, telling Samantha how to label the diagram and modeling the process for her. The initial attempt at diagramming included relatively little information; of the three systems the team was expected to design for, the students had only accounted for the body of the drone itself (Figure 10, below). Samantha took a picture of the diagram and uploaded it to the Google Docs folder, where it could be added to the PDR. The team submitted their documentation late, had a partial design at the time, and received only 12.5/20 points (see rubric, Figure 11).

Reviewer Comments:

• Note that the challenge may be indoors with smaller boxes/bins than the 10’x10’ outdoor tarps.

• Need more specifics on dropper design. What concept have you downselected from your research + brainstorming?

• Add these extra dropper/payload materials to your BOH/Costs, as well as the laptop to monitor the camera output. Is the camera new or used?

Despite the frustration the team had endured, this was the last checkpoint prior to the final documentation grade enforcing the students’ official documentation. Once the harrowing experience had passed, the team experienced a lull in their documentation practices, taking sparse notes here and there. The documenter, Samantha, was often distracted from her role; Billie, her friend, took her on missions around the school building that could have been accomplished with one student, and at times Samantha was absent or seemingly unaware that there was information to be captured. She only took ownership of her role, even reminding other students to record information, when the team as a whole came to see the value of documentation through a series of crises and emotional stimuli.