Category: Engineering communicationPage 1 of 2

Reflections on video selfie training

Yesterday at Think Up I ran a workshop training engineers in how to use selfie movies to tell communicate to people about engineering. The aim of the workshop…

Stressed by stressed ribbons – teaching notes from Southampton

One of the groups of students that Ben Godber and I teach at the University of Southampton is designing a stressed ribbon footbridge as their entry for a…

Being Bazalgette – a new work experience idea

Today at Think Up, Ed McCann and I had lunch with Mike Chrimes from the Institution of Civil Engineers. The main topic on the menu was how to…

Building the Forth Bridge on Stage

For my first time on stage at Science Showoff back in November 2011, I decided to recreate the famous public demonstration conducted by engineer Benjamin Baker to reassure…

Babbling about Babel: penning a new routine for Science Showoff

I’ve just signed up to do a slot at the final Science Showoff to be held at the Wilmington Arms on Tuesday June 4th. I haven’t written any…

Using construction site notebooks as a teaching tool

Today the Expedition-Imperial team met to plan their week at this year’s Constructionarium. The learning experience is intense on site at the Constructionarium, with students on their feet…

The Return of Low Carb

Yesterday I was at the Big Rig facilitating the annual low-carbon skills challenge at the Big Rig. This is the fourth year in a row that Think Up…

Facilitating the Global Grand Challenges Student Day

Today Think Up facilitated the Global Grand Challenges Student Day at the Royal Academy of Engineering. The student day is a prelude to the main Global Grand Challenges…

Chemistry, engineering and Abbey Road studios

My courting of the chemical engineering world continued today with a visit to the ChemEng department at Imperial. Today it got even better, because not only do chemical…

Why did the Toucan cross the road?

I was cycling from Islington to Old Street this afternoon and saw a sign saying ‘Cyclists, push button for Toucan crossing’. Odd, as there weren’t any Toucans in…

The Architecture of Pasta Shapes

I just spotted this while reading someone else’s Christmas present. “The more interesting pasta shapes, such as the shell-shaped conchiglie, or the ear-like orecchiette, didn’t just happen…Those clever…

Going full circle on the Overground

I feel like a bit of a wally standing here in the rain at Clapham High Street Overground station. There are many shorter ways to get me home, which…

The New River Clissold Park to Finsbury Park

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A3 Hindhead Tunnel: User notes for the London-to-Portsmouth Motorist

For many years the London to Portsmouth motorist would often have been delayed in tail-backs where the A3 wound its way up the closely packed contours of the…

Skyfall, starring Daniel Craig…and Bazalgette’s sewerage system

Being set mostly in London, the latest James Bond film, Skyfall, takes us an action-packed tour of some the city’s great engineering projects: disused Underground tunnels, Bazalgette‘s embankment…

Built in Britain

Yesterday I watched the first episode of Evan Davis‘s two-part programme Built in Britain. If you like engineering then you’ll love this. It is great to see a…

Speaking with Pictures – Peter Ayres at Big Draw Big Make at the V&A

This afternoon M and I dropped in to the V&A to see what was happening at Big Draw, Big Make. The first talk that caught our eye was Speaking…

Happy Birthday Livic – Seven Years Old!

Back in 2004, I and fellow civil engineering student Andy Kosinski got together to create a new student newspaper for the civil engineering department at Imperial College. It…

Thoughts on developing a social media strategy for an educational resource

Over the last few weeks at Think Up we have been getting our Workshed site (an open educational resource) ready for the start of the new university academic…

World tour of structural form at Cafe Scientifique

A big thank you to the lovely audience at Cafe Scientifique Brighton who welcomed me this evening for my talk, A World Tour of Structural Form. I felt…

Notes from Migrations at the Tate Britain

Notes on a few things that caught my engineer’s eye at the Migrations exhibition at the Tate Britain today. ‘Quickly Away Thanks to Pneumatic Doors’ and ‘Soon in…

Roll up roll up engineering communicators…time for more Science Showoff

…it’s Science Showoff time (well it will be next Tuesday). That magnificent monthly occasion when enthusiasts from all walks of science tread the boards in an entertaining manner…

The Future of Construction, Surveying…and rock’n’roll?

The flying robots that Vijay Kumar and his team have built are breathtaking. In this TED talk, he explains how the flying machines work, shows how they can fly…

Cooking with Concrete at Science Showoff 5

Thanks to everyone who came down to Science Showoff 5 to see my first attempt at Cooking with Concrete on stage. I think I was able to convince…

The Rise and Fall of Civil Engineering – courtesy Google’s amazing ngram viewer

I read an astonishing article this afternoon titled ‘Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books‘, published early last year in the journal Science. Based on Google’s…

Good laughs at Science Showoff

I went down to Science Showoff last night at the Wilmington arms, ‘an open mic night for all communicators of science’. The spectrum of material covered was rather…

Resisting Ikea – preparing for Monday’s sustainability conference

I spent most of last weekend preparing for a sustainability conference that we ran on Monday (post about that event appearing shortly). I know from experience that the…

Using the Flipped Classroom model with Expedition Workshed

It’s been one of those days where everything comes together. I have spent the day working on Expedition Workshed site, in particular a new blog aimed helping us…

Showreal – Millennium Bridge Micro Documetary

Early this year I was filmed presenting a short clip about the Millennium Bridge by a TV production company developing a concept for a new engineering show. We…

In the can

In the can: the Useful Simple Trust launch film. I don’t quite remember how I got briefed to make this film. It probably went something along the lines…