melbard

The following outline for a Trig*Star Presentation was used last spring at Germantown High School. We (Joy Zastrow-Mulcahy and myself, Al Melbard) made presentations to two math classes. We provided the students with handouts, example survey plats, ran a short video and gave a short total station demonstration.

Al	10 Minutes
	Introduction and thanks for allowing us to visit your class.
	Discuss the Trig*Star Program and the upcoming exam
	Go over the awards handout, which shows Trig*Star awards at all levels (local, state and national)
	Give a brief history by starting with the Mt. Rushmore picture on the handout.
	Washington surveyed the Potomac River for a future canal.
	Lincoln surveyed and divided land north of Springfield, IL.
	However, Jefferson's contribution was more significant because it affects us daily.
	He was the father of the USPLSS.
	Give a brief history of the Public Land Survey System in WI.
	Show how Germantown fits into the rectangular system.
	Give street names familiar to the students.
	Another interesting historical fact about George Everest,
	He was the British Surveyor General of India about 1840,
	After his death, his survey crews who were surveying in the Himalayas at the time,
	Named the highest mountain in the world in his honor.

Video	10 Minutes
	Run the video "Surveying a Career without Boundaries"
	See the Resources web page for more information on this video.

Joy	10 Minutes
	Discuss how I got involved in surveying and why I enjoy it.
	Show examples of the type of work my company does.
	Handout an example subdivision plat from Germantown or a copy of a page from a plat book.
	Briefly discuss the use of modern surveying equipment and techniques such as CAD, GPS, Aerial Photogrammetry, etc.

Al	10 minutes
&	Demonstrate the Total Station
Joy	Set up two prisms, one in the room and the other out the door in the hallway.
	Measure the distance to each prism and the angle between the two lines.
	Have students look through the telescope on the total station.
	Sketch the measurements on the board in the classroom.
	Using the Law of Cosines, have the students compute unknown distance, which is actually right through the wall into the hallway.
	Discuss the use of linear surveying units (feet and decimals, not inches and fractions)
	Discuss the use of angular surveying units (degrees, minutes and seconds)

Al	5 Minute
&	Wrap up
Joy	Give date for Trig*Star Exam
	Remind students they will need to be able to work with:
	Angles in the form of Degrees, Minutes and Seconds
	Not to round off intermediate answers, only the final answer.
	Review basic Geometry such as
	Summation of angles in a triangle
	Summation of angles in a multi-sided figure
	Summation of angles making up a straight line
	Principal of the shortest distance between a point and a line
	Review basic Trig such as Right Triangle functions and the Law of Sines and Cosines

	Questions?
	Thank students for their attention.

Handouts used:	Example Presentation Handout
	Example Trig*Star Awards Handout