Session FH: Minisymposium II: Fluid Mechanics Education

Flow Visualization for K-12 Outreach

The talk will begin with an introduction to the minisymposium, including the context of physics education research. One component of fluids education is K-12 outreach. Fluid mechanics is rarely emphasized in K-12 curricula, with the exception of lift and drag, buoyancy, and some Earth Science related physics. Thus care must be taken when creating outreach activities to ensure relevance. For example, curricula are increasingly defined in terms of state science standards, so outreach activities will be more successful if they address local standards explicitly. Other considerations include keeping equipment costs low, ensuring materials are safe and available, providing continuing education credits for participating teachers, emphasizing hands-on activities, incorporating quantitative aspects, as well as assessment of student learning, etc. Flow visualization activities are well-suited to the needs of K-12 outreach, for both formal and informal science education. A wide range of flow physics can be demonstrated with minimal equipment and non-toxic fluids, including basic fluids concepts which are not typical in K-12 curricula such as laminar vs. turbulent flow, vortex dynamics, and instability. The challenge is to devise activities that are both directly related to science standards and are interesting enough to inspire the next generation. Several activities which have been developed in conjunction with a unique course ``Flow Visualization: the Physics and Art of Fluid Flow'' will be described.   

The Role of CFD in Undergraduate Fluid Mechanics Education

Instruction of undergraduate fluid mechanics is greatly enhanced through integration of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) into fluid mechanics courses and labs. Specifically, students are able to visualize fluid flows with CFD and are better able to understand those flows by performing parametric studies. At Penn State, CFD has been carefully integrated into our introductory junior-level fluid mechanics course, yet displaces only about one class period. The key is to show demonstrations and assign homework that use CFD as a tool that helps students learn the basic concepts of fluid mechanics. The \textit{application} of CFD (grid generation, boundary conditions, etc.), rather than numerical algorithms, is stressed. This is done through use of short, pre-defined templates for FlowLab, a student-friendly analysis and visualization package created by Fluent, Inc. The textbook by \c{C}engel and Cimbala (McGraw-Hill 2006) contains 46 end-of-chapter homework problems that are used in conjunction with 42 FlowLab templates. Each exercise has been designed with two major learning objectives in mind: (1) enhance student understanding of a specific fluid mechanics concept, and (2) introduce the student to a specific capability and/or limitation of CFD through hands-on practice. More templates are being developed that emphasize the first objective. The flow of fluid between two concentric rotating cylinders is a good example of a problem that is solved approximately, analytically, and with CFD, and the results are compared to enhance learning.   

Fluid mechanics films in the 21st century

The 1960's-era National Committee for Fluid Mechanics Films produced 39 famous 16mm films - dated but still in use - with 3 million dollars of NSF funding. Here we examine the nature of new fluid mechanics films, goals, media changes, and practicality. Examples are given of new narrated videos produced to illustrate chapters of a basic fluids text and provide a ``glimpse through the laboratory window.'' Both experiments and CFD are featured, though the facilities needed for the former are declining. The fundamentally-visual nature of the topic is emphasized with no repetition of text or equations. We believe this visual nature of fluid mechanics is the key to its role in renewed efforts to bolster US science education. This is one - not the only - paradigm for new fluid mechanics films. While inflation makes such film production perhaps 6 times more expensive than in the 1960's, there are offsetting economies based on consumer video technology and digital desktop production. Nonetheless, funding new educational fluid mechanics videos in the 21st century remains a daunting prospect.   

Using Assessment in Fluid Mechanics Courses to Improve Student Learning and Motivation

Building on the peer-instruction method of teaching documented by Eric Mazur, assessment-integrated instruction has affected student learning in basic fluid mechanics. This presentation will include description of the use in-class assessment systems for immediate assessment and feedback on student learning. The discussion will include description of assessment-integrated instruction in engineering, and the impact on study habits of the students, learning methods, and conceptual framework development. In addition, the presentation will include a description of the role of concept inventories, used to measure conceptual understanding, in teaching and learning in fluid mechanics.   

Content of a Graduate Course in Fluid Mechanics

This talk will give some of my personal choices for educating specialists in fluid flow. The first course should emphasize physics and leave CFD, turbulence, microflows, surface tension flows, and other specialties to separate courses. General topics that should be covered include: concepts and definitions; physical and viscous laws; control volume laws; local laws; elemental flow situations; dimensional analysis, and the characteristics of different flow categories (Stokes flow, lubrication theory, ideal flow, boundary layers, etc.). At the graduate level, more precision and rigor is desired. Exact solutions are valuable as examples of physical events and as illustrations of trends for concepts and properties. The availability of Excel, Mathcad, or Matlab allows students to investigate and visualize flow properties and their trends with parameters. Dimensional analysis should not end with correlations and similarity, but also emphasize variable scaling, variable references, and proper forms for limiting parameters to extreme values. Graduate students need to view flow categories as parameter limits for certain boundary conditions. Asymptotic expansions are a formal mathematical structure for flow categories. I use the Jeffrey-Hammel wedge flow as an exact solution that demonstrates the various categories of incompressible flows for all Reynolds number limits. An integrated knowledge of physics is an advanced viewpoint that extends specific knowledge of a series of flow patterns.