night light evaluation

Setareh Gerashi 8D D.T. - Mr. Elder Night Light Evaluation For the last term and a half, I have been working on my night light project, as well as the bottle rocket project. This year we had two projects just like last year but instead we had half the year to work on it, but twice a week instead of once. The aim of this project was to produce a successful nightlight for our planned age group and a circuit that works. I fulfilled these requirements successfully and was able to produce a beautiful nightlight that met the design specification. The five steps of the design cycle are investigation, design, plan, create and evaluate. I followed each step thoroughly understanding what to do and doing it with the best of my ability. My final design is a bit different according to my plan and my design, but I have perfect reasons to support what caused me to change my final product. I had lots of fun working on this project since I spent a lot of time in the workshop and I learnt a lot and enjoyed my experience for the past first and a half terms. I am very proud of what I have produced since I can now use it to light up my room at nights! Even though it doesn’t suit my age, I am just happy that I have successfully made myself my own night light! The first stage of the project is the investigation stage. The investigation stage helped me a lot along my way to thinking about my night light. Although I had many ideas, the design brief, analyzing three night lights, and the design specification helped me make better choices and helped me think better about what I wanted my final to look light. After some searching on the internet for my three analysis, I had a idea of what I wanted my night light to look like, what shape will it be, for what ages will it be for, what gender and finally what theme will it have as all these ideas make a successful and effective night light. For the design specification, I worked very well and effectively seeing as I had ideas in advanced which I wanted it to be for all my designs. I wanted my night light to be design specifically for girl who are quite girly. I thought colour like pink, purple, red and white are colours in which you might find in most girls possessions so I will use these main colours as well as other ones but these will be the main ones. I had the thought of having hearts, kisses or polka dots as one of the main backgrounds and designs of the three designs since these are quite popular now. Why I chose a girly theme is firstly because I know what girls like and would want their night light to look like since I am a girl and then when I finished my project, I can either keep it in my room beside my bedside table or give it to someone special, like my younger cousin or even my best friend. Keeping for myself or giving it to my best friend who is my age doesn’t necessarily mean that they are afraid of the dark, it can mean that I am proud of my final product and that it looks nice and matches my bedroom theme or that giving it to a friend makes them feel special since I have worked very hard on it and that I am willing to give it as a gift to them. I wrote how all my designs will have a wooden foundation and they will have walls that will be made out of transparent paper with the design printed on it. I wrote how the dimensions will not exceed 30cmx30cmx30cm which I successfully didn’t. I wrote how all my circuits will at least have a light bulb, a battery, a switch and a variable resistor. But since the electric goods didn’t arrive to Doha in time, then Mr. Elder just advised me to choose an existing switch from the store room and then write in my evaluation my explanation and my changes, which I am going to explain later on. As I wrote my specification, I came to realize that safety is a very important issue and a important aspect if you are making a night light for children since we would our product to be suitable for the user which I have planned for (two–twelve year olds) and to make sure that it doesn’t cause the user to get injured. If we don’t think about safety then we are totally not understanding the concept and understanding of making a night light for my type of user. When I thought of safety, many thoughts came to my mind. I though of having slightly curved end that will not easily tear into the child’s skin, I thought of having the circuit inside where the child cannot easily get an electric shock but what was quite good is that the circuit is powered by battery so that avoids electric shocks from taking place. But placing the circuit inside with all the wires and the bulb just makes it more secure for the child. But I thought in advance about the switch and what I’ve done is that I have drilled a hole and stuck the push button of the switch inside the hole so that the user can easily access the switch without interfering with the inside where the wires and the battery is. It is also a good idea for the light bulb to be inside the night light so the child cannot hurt itself with the heated bulb. I think I worked hard on the analysis seeing that I had many points for positive points, negative points and improvement points and reasons for them and I had more than a lot of my classmates and friends. I really concentrated on the analysis even though it wasn’t a big part of my grade, it really helped me see negative points and positive points so that I could base my own night light on them and hopefully create a more improved one based on what I had learnt. On the conclusion for all three analyses I wrote about how all the information helped me on giving me hints to remember while making my night light and the negative points helped me think of ways how to avoid such mistakes. So overall, analyses are a great way to making you product more effective and a way of getting you to think hard on positive, negative points as well as how to improve them. From my analysis I learnt many things including how I shouldn’t make the light too bright so the child doesn’t have difficulty sleeping, how it should look sweet and lovable since little girls, perhaps older ones too, are very warmhearted and sweet looking nightlights attract their attention and will like them very much and this will hopefully get them to solve their fears of sleeping in the dark when they can easily sleep with a night light and they won't be scared at all or have thoughts such as a monster being their bed. Another important part of the investigation is how to make circuits. The very first thing we did is learnt the difference between a parallel circuit and a series circuit which is that a parallel circuit is a circuit in which the identical voltage is presented to all components, where the current is divided equally among the components according to the resistance. And a series circuit is a circuit where all the electrical charges flow along the same path. Another difference is that if there’s any break in the series circuit will stop the flow of the current but if there’s a break in one branch in a parallel circuit, it will not stop the flow of the current in the other branches. I am doing a simple series circuit which I planned by using the program called “Crocodile Clips” which after creating your ideal circuit, either parallel or series, it tells you whether it will work or no by the light bulb light or not. Devices such as a variable resistor, Crocodile Clips shows you how it makes the light bulb brighter and dimmer. By using Crocodile Clips, I made all three of my designs. All the equipments I used, Mr. Elder said they will be available by the time we are almost finishing our D.T. unit so I was very sure that I will find the equipments by the end of the unit which the last lesson is on Monday 11 th February and since we don’t have school on Wednesday and Thursday, we miss our second D.T. class on Wednesday. Overall, I have found this program very useful and what’s good is that it is downloadable and it’s completely free which I have now thanks to Mr. Elder who introduced it to us. I think it will be very useful for the future so I will definitely remember to use it on future projects and circuits. The second part of the cycle is the design cycle. For the design cycle we have to create three designs on A4 paper with the exact colours and listed dimension for width, length and breadth for all sides in addition to an A3 size paper with the final design which I chose to base my final project on, which has to be fully coloured and have the listed dimensions. Since my is printed and there are different sides with different designs, Mr. Elder excused me and let me have the net of my night light, but although that was going exceed the A3 paper limit, I was allowed to scale it down but I had to state that on the A3 paper. Also for the A4 copies, I printed six pages with all the designs on each page and I wrote that whether it front the front, the back, side 1, side 2, side 3, side 4, top or bottom in addition to the dimensions. Again, this made life easier and Mr. Elder said that its fine with him as long as I make it clear what’s what and what it’s dimensions were and I labeled everything. Labeling does not only help the teacher, or improve my grade, but it also does help me organize myself and know what everything is and help me more when it comes to creating the product. So far everything was quite easy and didn’t take more than a week and a half. What I did with some of my designs is that I edited it on the school computer using a program called Photoshop CS. I basically just edited the colours either making them more pinkish or more purplish so that it matched all the other sides. After doing this, I did four justifications on three justifying why I chose the three main designs and one justifying why I chose my final design. Choosing the final design was quite hard at first but then I thought harder thinking which would be the most popular if I was a company and I was selling my product. When I chose the second design, later on I came to a decision that it seemed the one I also like the best. Since I wanted to make life easier, I worked on this stage at home as well since I wanted to finish this stage as soon as possible and get onto the plan and finally the best part, the creating stage. So I worked on it on my weekends and on week days when I had free time. This way at home I could spend more time and effort on improving it. I also went over my whole project seeing on what I could improve or any minor mistakes I have made. Everything I had done was good but by the first term when the teacher checked our folders, I had my A3 copy of my design missing because I didn’t want to fold my big sheet in half and stuff it in my small folder, I kept it safe at home but now I learnt a lot and I have learnt from my mistakes. So for next time, I will not forget to put everything in the folder so Mr. Elder can check them and won't think I haven't done something when I have done them but haven't put it in my folder. I will be more careful in the future so I can get full credit on what I have done. In the plan, I made sure I wrote as accurately as possible in how my steps and my method was going to go although there might have been some minor changes but haven't completely altered the method. The plan helped me to follow it and make sure I am doing everything correctly and in order without altering other steps and creating problems because something has been done before something else. What I hadn’t done was include the table in my plan, and this lowered my mark by one point which is a very careless mistake. It was my fault anyway because I hadn’t checked the G Drive for what had to go to the plan since I knew and I also asked the teacher if I was correct. Although I did say in the plan how many pieces I had and what the sizes were, it was just the table missing. But other than that, I think I did very well in this stage as I did state everything clearly and my method was as accurate as it could be and in the right order. How I can improve my plan is that I could describe my explanations better and why I chose certain things so that helps me learn more as I begin to think more and it helps me decide which things I should chose as I start thinking about my plan and what I use and how I do my nightlight project. The plan would give a accurate idea of how the whole process of making and creating the product will be, how it will work and will keep me in flow of working smoothly as I will know what exactly to do and when I have to do it in addition to knowing all the equipments I will need and the machines. I also learned the names of the machines as I was doing the plan since some names I got confused up with and with the help of Mr. Elder I figured them all out. And finally – the create stage! (other than the evaluate stage which I'm doing right now) I love this stage because after all the planning and designing and deciding we plan the actual product, the night light that is. I love this stage because it is the only stage where we can go to the workshop and actually work rather than paper work in most of the other classes and that’s why I find D.T. very special subject. At the beginning I took my plan every time I went into the workshop so I followed it correctly and as I had planned to which keeps every thing smooth and organized. Everything went well and I worked with the best of my ability and tried to avoid any slowing down since this year we don’t have the whole year and I made sure the change didn’t slow me down. The only problems I have had is that about twice Mr. Elder wasn’t in school and I had planned what I was going to do and fast since we were coming to an end, but that didn’t matter because for the last four weeks before the D.T./I.T. change, I went to D.T. after school on Sundays and Mondays and stayed until 3pm and worked in the workshop. All the paperwork or typed work, I did at home to speed things up and used my time in the workshop since I didn’t have items including a glue gun, filers, sand papers, drillers, wood glue and the iron for soldering at home so I planned my lessons and after school days effectively in an organized manner. I worked in a behaved manner in the workshop at all times especially when the teacher was out of the workshop and I always tried helping my friends and classmates whenever I got the time by either cleaning up at the end of the day or when I was free at that time or when I was waiting for Mr. Elder, I made myself useful by helping others. The structure/foundation of my night light took only three lessons even though it could’ve taken less, but the problem was that because there wasn’t enough wood glue on the pillars it broke off easily and I also had to use clenches and when you use those, it will be difficult having all pillars supported by clenches so I did it carefully and two at a time and one got wasted when I broke and I had to put it up again. When putting clenches with glue, you have to also wait at least 24 hours before taking them off so that also added to how long it took. The pillars and the bases where all good in shape and they all fitted properly and stood in great position which meant my measuring skills were quite good. Everything else went as planned and continued without any major problems occurring along the way. Overall, my whole project turned out good but there are quite a bit of problems that occurred along the way which made me change some things and the only thing I could do is write in the plan what I changed, why I decided to change it and how I could reflect and improve for next time. Well one of the things I changed was my chosen circuit. My chosen circuit was my first one and it was suppose to have a light bulb, a light bulb holder, a 9v battery, a 9v battery holder, a SPST switch and a variable resistor. What my changed circuit had was instead of a SPST switch I had a switch which the light would go on if you held on to it which meant that it would be totally useless to what the aim of the whole project was which it was to create a nightlight that worked and mines did but it would go off as soon as you took your hand off. When I discussed this to Mr. Elder, he told me to wait until the end of our D.T. unit and create the circuit at the end. At first I decided to wait but when we only had three weeks left, Mr. Elder told me to write in my evaluation that the electronic goods for the Design Technology unit hadn’t arrived in time for us to use them. This wouldn’t get marks off us since we were told that they were going to provide us and in this school and this program, the paper work is more important than the product so it is better to write and explain in the evaluation then wait until the last day to make your product perfect. The second thing was that I was also suppose to have a variable resistor so that the child could customize it so that they are comfortable with the brightness of the light, but that didn’t work out well either because of the same problem as the SPST switch, they didn’t arrive on time. Another big change was that when I had all the sides put of except one, the front, I was planning to put the circuit in first and then close the side but then I didn’t think in advance in how I would change the battery when it finishes. I was thinking of cutting a square at the bottom of my night light which can be taken off and put on by having nails which you can screw open and closer and then put legs at the bottom to make it stand but since I had my other project to work on and I saw that Mr. Elder was extremely busy with everyone else who have done less work than me, then I thought why not have the front stuck on but with three sides not stuck on so that we can lift it up and change the battery. This would take less time, I could this evaluation in my evaluation although it would’ve been a better idea if I cut the bottom off. But now I have learnt from what I have done so that the next time if I do something like this, I know that to do! Overall, I think I have not just worked hard in producing this product but also planning and designing and all the stages before it. I have recorded what I have done everyday Questionnaire: 1. What other colours could I have used? 2. How could I alter my circuits? 3. How could my night light have been safer? 4.