![Robert Chaney, left, and Fred Thomas began working out their ideas for simple machines to teach math and science concepts as part of the Sinclair Community College faculty team developing curricula for the Dayton, Ohio, college's ATE manufacturing center in the 1990s. This photo was taken at a Learning with Math Machines Inc. workshop in 2013.](local/data/caches/images/scaled/img_00019043_300x300.jpg)
Sinclair Community College colleagues Fred Thomas and Robert Chaney took an entrepreneurial approach to their National Science Foundation Advanced Technological Education project.
They formed Learning with Math Machines Inc., a non-profit company that provides interdisciplinary professional development workshops and sells their math machines. The machines are small robots and gadgets that facilitate adaptation of calculators, personal computers, and other readily available equipment to allow students to see and experience tactilely what happens when they manipulate algebra and other math and science concepts.
"If they [students] can express it algebraically they can see what happens immediately. It has an enormous effect on learning simply because they get immediate feedback. If it doesn't do what they want it to do, they don't have to wait for me to grade their paper," said Thomas. He's now retired from Sinclair and runs the day-to-day operations of the company as CEO.
Chaney continues to teach math at Sinclair using the math machines they developed with an ATE project grant. In November, he was selected as 2013 Outstanding Community College Professor of the Year by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. His award-winning pedagogy will be the subject of the February 17 ATE@20 blog.