From the simplest equations of Hydrodynamics to science and engineering modeling skills

• Published in: Modelling in science education and learning Vol. 10; no. 2; pp. 211 - 222
• Main Authors: Juan Carlos Castro-Palacio, Luisberis Velázquez-Abad, Milton H. Perea, Esperanza Navarro-Pardo, Dagoberto Acosta-Iglesias, Pedro Fernández-de-Córdoba-Castellá
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universitat Politècnica de València 01.08.2017
• Subjects: enseñanza de la Física; habilidades de modelación
• ISSN: 1988-3145
• DOI: 10.4995/msel.2017.7143

The development of modeling skills is a very important issue in Science teaching nowadays. The present work illustrates how, from the simplest equations of hydrodynamics, it is possible to contribute to this end. Bernoulli and continuity equations are included in Physics syllabi of secondary and university levels, and can be seen as a linking between general and professional education. By means of the proposed project, students are taken through general stages which are usually present in any engineering project or research work based on modeling and simulation. such as the formulation of the problem, the statement of the Physics model, a computational simulation and the comparison between theory and experiments. This kind of project allows for the development of modeling skills and also to some other typical skills of the scientist's and engineer's profiles nowadays, such as  fitting and graphing analysis. It is common to see that secondary and  first year university courses do not contribute much to the formation of modeling skills, instead they rather contribute to particular skills from the perspective of the different subjects. On the other hand, students are usually more motivated for the modeling of real world situations than for idealized ones.