Purdue University TRAILS

TRAILS 2.0 offers a place-based learning context that enables students to explore their local environment and connect with STEM professionals from their region.

TRAILS Lesson Plans

Lesson focuses on teams of students using nature-derived inspiration to design a functioning solar panel that can charge a cell phone. Students study the need for renewable energy production and use knowledge of folding patterns in nature to create their

Flight of the Bumblebee

This is an integrated lesson to be used in Physical Science and Computer Integrated Manufacturing Class. The focus is on how to produce lift with flapping wings, investigating butterflies, ornithopters and finishing in the creation of a 3-d printed wing

Animal Architects

This unit takes biological phenomena such as transpiration of plants, laws of thermodynamics, animal behavior and regulation of body temperature, to create innovative, eco-friendly housing and landscape designs. This unit specifically focuses on the need for sustainable development by implementing

D-Bait

Using principles of ecosystem interactions and buoyancy, students will design and 3D print real fishing lures that imitate the behaviors of aquatic insects.

Engineering Design

Biomimicry

Scientific Inquiry

3D Printing

Place-based STEM Education

TRAILS 2.0 offers a place-based learning context that enables students to explore their local environment and connect with STEM professionals from their region.

TRAILS Lesson Plans

Fishing Lure Design Contest

Communication

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