CRN 6676 Syllabus

Syllabus for CRN 6676 COLLAB: Disruptive Home Economics
Tuesday 1800 – 2040
Room: 304
Building: Arnhold Hall 55 W13th

Instructor:
James Powderly
powderly at eyebeam dot org

Class Collaborator:
Phillip Torrone, Senior Editor Make Magazine
pt at oreilly dot com
Class Description and Overview:
Disruptive Home Economics will take us all through the center and to the fringe of what it means to make-it and do-it-yourself. Through in-class workshops and small group or individual assignments, this course will expose students, instructors and guests to a range of tools and public domain research selected to expand our concept of what we can make ourselves at home. We will start by making or modifying existing DIY and How-to projects and studying the way other makers solve problems and create documentation. Over the course of the semester, we will get hands-on experience designing, documenting and sharing our own DIY projects and research. We will take a generalist’s approach and expose ourselves to projects that involve a wide range of mechanical, electrical, computational and chemical processes. We will combine novel tools and materials with common ones and build projects for ourselves as well as tools for others. Along the way, we will also look at the way local and global cultural contexts influence the tools and technologies we make and those we use, as well as the implications of open source production by the masses. Students will be encouraged to release their work as openly and widely as possible and to experiment with traditional and contagious distribution of their projects.

Phillip Torrone, senior editor from MAKE magazine, will be contributing critical feedback and experience to all of our projects. His evolving role will provide the class with access to a broader network of makers, hackers and hobbyists, as well as an opportunity to receive print and on-line exposure. All assignments will receive instructor evaluation and peer feedback. Final and mid-term projects will receive feedback from instructors, peers, TBD guest critics and senior editors at MAKE and CRAFT.

Goals and Objectives:
The goal of Disruptive Home Economics is simply to expand our ability to make things at home, whether for entertainment, expression or survival. To meet this goal we are going to learn to identify and use open resources, to undertake our own amateur research projects and to benefit from open means of documentation, licensing, release and collaboration. As artists, designers and citizens we may have to become amateur scientists, tailors, chemists, programmers, mechanics, doctors, cooks, soldiers, undertakers, pharmacists, etc. to execute our cross-disciplinary, multi-media, hybrid projects. It is worth noting, that on a global scale, it’s quite common for individuals to use all these informally acquired and unpaid skills as part of their daily routine just to survive. We will learn to access our “inner-MacGyver”, tackle some simple physics and chemistry, improvise available materials, and apply these skills in workshops and on project-based assignments.

Students in Disruptive Home Economics must be prepared to:

• Expand their ability to make things using mechanical, electrical, computational and chemical means
• Participate in hands-on workshops collaborating with other students in small groups, as well as lead their own projects from conceptualization to design, fabrication, documentation and release.
• Release their work to the public at large and receive in-class critiques from professional engineers, artists, designers and peers, as well as uncensored, raw feedback from an extended network of hackers, hobbyists and makers on-line.
• Directly enrich their current CDT studies by learning to find available public domain resources, improving their fabrication skills across a wide range of media
• Learn to rely on their own technical knowledge and become less reliant on instructors and technical experts.
• Teach themselves and each other, as well as share their knowledge beyond the CDT classroom.
• Participate in the emerging open knowledge and open source hardware movement.
• Expand their hand-on and applied knowledge of how things work with a basic understanding of theoretical physics, chemistry and computer science (this will include two quizzes).
• Research and discuss the cultural contexts in which technologies are created and, most importantly, used in order to better understand our relationship with technology and become better makers.
• Take two simple but very real quizzes.
• Be brave in the face of guts, fire, acid and math.

III. The Fine Print
Disruptive Home Economics meets for one two-hour and forty minute session per week, and at least 6 hours of work per week is expected from each student. As per University policy, 3 absences are grounds for failure. Two absences will result in an automatic academic warning. Lateness or early departure from class may also translate into one full absence. Individual faculty members may, at their discretion, set attendance standards that are more stringent than that described above. Such standards will be made clear, in writing, at the beginning of the semester.

IV. Criteria for evaluation
If you are in this class you are in a gang and you will be evaluated accordingly:

1. Participation and communication: You will be evaluated on how much you participate and contribute in the class. You will be asked to listen, participate in discussions and workshops, think critically, give each other feedback to the best of your ability and participate in sharing resources. This is the easy part.
2. Simple Physics Quiz: You will be asked to study and learn some very fundamental and simple physics so that you can directly apply it in class workshops. There will be a quiz. It will include question about workshop safety as well. It will not be difficult and you will have study material provided to you.
3. Simple Chemistry Quiz: You will be asked to study and learn some very fundamental and simple chemistry so that you can directly apply it in class workshops. There will be a quiz. It will include question about workshop safety as well. It will not be difficult and you will have study material provided to you.
4. Individual and Group Assignments: You will be evaluated on five project-based assignments. You can work on these projects individually or in small groups. Many of these projects will require you to make documentation of your process and release them to a network of makers. This will include your mid-term assignment. For this assignment you will be asked to make something for yourself or for your home.
5. Final Project: You will be evaluated on your final project. The final project will be to make a DIY tool designed for someone other than yourself. This will include project documentation and release.
6. Class Safety: If no one in the class gets hurt everyone will get an extra 5 points added to their grade. This is not a strident rule. You are all responsible for your own safety. I am offering this credit because keeping everyone safe is the top priority. If you wear your safety glasses and ear protection, pay attention in workshops and more importantly, in your own home, and watch out for each other, you will all be given extra credit for having good common sense.

Participation and communication: 25%
Simple Physics Quiz: 5%
Simple Chemistry Quiz: 5%
Individual and Group Assignments: 35%
Final Project: 30%
Class Safety: 5%

V. Undergraduate Grade Scale Descriptions
A = Work of exceptional quality.
A- = Work of high quality.
B+ = Work of high quality, higher than average abilities.
B = Very good work that satisfies goals of course.
B- = Good work.
C+ = Average work, understanding of course material.
C = Adequate work; passable
C- = Passing work but below good academic standing.
D = Below average work; does not fully understand the assignments.
F = Failure, no credit

VI . Weekly Schedule:

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WEEK 01 — 1/23/06

Intro to disruptive home economics
What are chemistry, physics and engineering to the home maker?

Assignment:

a.

Make one existing DIY project that you can find in the how-to ether (online, print, television, etc.). Keep it simple. A project you can complete in an afternoon. Bring the finished item to class.

b.

Find one project you would like to do but don’t have the a) time, b) skill, c) money or d) all of the above to make. Bring in some documentation of the instruction set.

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WEEK 02 — 1/30/06

Project presentations
Intro to electrical control
Intro to the Arduino
There will be a $4 or $5 dollar lab fee collected during this class for knitting supplies provided in the next class.

Assignment (due in two weeks):

a.

Purchase all the components needed to make the USB Arduino. I will give you a specific list of parts in class. You don’t need to buy the Arduino printed ciruit boards (PCBs) or the programmer

b.

Attend this event to learn more about the state of the knitted arts:
http://www.madmuseum.org/site/c.drKLI1PIIqE/b.1506945/k.3AD7/Radical_Lace__Subversive_Knitting.htm

Read:

The Cartoon Guide to Physics
p. 105 - 194

Read The Shock of the Old
P. TBA

resources:
http://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/Hardware

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WEEK 03 — 2/06/06

Knitting with Michelle Kempner from Robot Clothes
Learn to knit, purl and cast on.

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WEEK 04 — 2/13/06

Arduino soldering workshop
Do you have a soldering iron? Bring it in. I can bring like 8, maybe more.
By the end of the workshop you will be able to solder better than all your friends.

Assignment:

Finish what you started in class. Solder you Arduino board. Next week we program.

Read:
Some open source lit of some kind…

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WEEK 05 — 2/20/06

Arduino Programming Workshop
Switches + Motors + LEDs
If you don’t know what it is or how to use it you will after this and if you already do you can teach the class.

Assignment: Finish what we started in class. Experiment on your own with the Arduino. Document your work and release it online or in print.

Read:
A Cartoon Guide to Physics
P. 3-101

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WEEK 06 — 2/27/06

Intro to your mid-term project.
Taxidermy Workshop
4 real. Rat provided. If you would like another animal you have to provide it yourself and talk to me in advance. If you can’t handle this at all talk to me before this class.

Assignment: Rat + Arduino = assignment
Artificial Life. Document it and release it online or in print.
Study for simple quiz on physics using study guide.

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WEEK 07 — 3/06/06

Simple quiz on physics
Midterm Project Workshop

Assignment: Work on your midterm project.

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WEEK 08 — 3/13/06

Mid-term Presentations
Have a good break. No more Rats I promise.

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WEEK 09 — 3/20/06
Spring Break

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WEEK 10 — 3/27/06

Intro to the Post-Circuit Board Era?
Conductive paint, textile and rubber workshop

Assignment:
Experiment with conductive materials. Document your work. You know the rest.

Read:
The Cartoon Guide to Chemistry
P.1-128

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WEEk 11 — 4/03/06

Class at Eyebeam in the OpenLab
540 west 21st street
NY, NY 10011

Some thoughts on documentation
DIY Aspirin/Soap Workshop
We will work in small groups and learn to control and use chemical process to make things we can use in a pinch.

Assignment: Document a project you are currently working on in another class or an extant project that you have already completed and release the project onto a network of makers (print, online, television, etc.). You should release the project with enough time (2 days or more) to receive feedback from the maker community. This is an opportunity and invitation to experiment with documentation. This assignment is due in two weeks.

Read:
The Cartoon Guide to Chemistry
P. 227 - 244

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WEEK 12 — 4/10/06

Class Choice: TBD
We can do whatever we want, Cherokee Cooking, How to make Isaac Newton’s recipe for ink, sensor workshop, etc. Lets work together to find something of interest to a majority of the class. We will determine this workshop subject matter by the week after spring break.

Read:
Cartoon Guide to Chemistry
P. 129 - 226

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WEEK 13 — 4/17/06

Review documentation projects
Intro to Final Projects

Study for simple quiz on chemistry using study guide.

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WEEK 14 — 4/24/06

Simple quiz on chemistry
Intro to Practical Pyrotechnics
Schedule Class field trip to Brooklyn Airstrip this week? Just trust me.

Assignment: Work on final project

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WEEK 15 — 5/01/06

Final Project Workshop
New and Improved

Assignment: Work on final project and documentation

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WEEK 16 — 5/08/06

Last Class
Final Project Presentations
Now with more famous guest critics
Good luck and good night.

Resources for Class:

The Cartoon Guide to Chemistry by Larry Gonick and Craig Criddle
The Cartoon Guide to Physics by Larry Gonick and Art Huffman
The Shock of the Old by David Edgerton

http://www.instructables.com/
http://makezine.com/
http://craftzine.com/
http://www.wikihow.com/Main-Page
http://www.inventiondb.com/
http://www.ehow.com/
http://www.hackaday.com/
http://graffitiresearchlab.com/
http://www.instructables.com/forum/E2DWXTK0DQETVPKL64/
http://www.howstuffworks.com/

Add comment January 30th, 2007