Page 70 - 東華三院辛亥年總理中學－周年特刊

Dream, Research, Design & Technology

設計與科技科 張冠威老師

Human beings are classified as the most talented and an economic project.
cleverest animal in the world. We have the ability to American engineers the
think, to research, to plan and to execute. That’s why Wright Brothers designed
the way we live in the 21 century is totally different the famous three-axis-
st
from that 2000 years ago. Thinking, researching, control, which enabled the
planning and execution successfully introduced lots pilot to steer the aircraft
of inventions, and we are still using some of them effectively and to maintain
nowadays! its equilibrium. After a
myriad of failed attempts,
In dreams, there is nothing impossible and there is no they successfully turned their “glider” into “flyer” in
limit on people’s thinking. From the perspective of 1903, which is known as the first successful airplane
the people living 2000 years ago, flying seemed to be and their design became and remains standard on all
a “mission impossible”. At that time, if someone said kinds of fixed-wing aircrafts.
“I believe I can fly”, it would mean he/she is going to
thrive in certain aspects. People had no idea on how Technology is probably the newest concept among
the world looks like from the perspective of eagles, the four mentioned in this article. Technology is
owls and birds. Yet, since some of us dreamed to fly composed of knowledge from different areas. It is a
freely, up in the sky, some people initiated a series of collection of techniques, skills, methods and processes
attempts and actions, which may allow human beings used in the production of goods or services or in
to fly in the sky. the accomplishment of any tasks/objectives, such as
scientific investigations. The application of technology
People conduct researches with all sorts of purposes, probably began with the conversion of natural
from how to cook a dish in its best manner, to how to resources into simple tools. Technology improves
create a new vaccine for an incurable disease. People our lives by utilizing resources and controlling the
wanted to fly like birds. Therefore, they were inspired environment in certain aspects. Across all the years,
by lots of things, such as feathers, wings, kites and today’s aviation is far more developed than that in
balloons. They conducted researches on the reasons the Wright Brothers’ time. Our airplanes today have
why birds, kites and balloons could go into the air. functions including air-conditioning, humidity control,
Many brave researchers in the early period, attempted GPS and autopilot. They did not come with the
tower jumping with the wings/kites they self-made. invention “airplane”. They are regarded as the upgrades
Although most of them were seriously injured or dead, on airplanes under today’s advanced technology.
they made progress on flying.
The history of aviation is a good “dreams come true”
Design is the creation of a plan or convention for example. The STEM education in Hong Kong promotes
the construction of an object, system or measurable the importance of Science, Technology, Engineering
human interaction. Human beings design things with and Mathematics in education. Our students can
supporting reasons and theories. These reasons can definitely achieve more with D&T included in their
be aesthetic, economic, functional and sociopolitical curriculum.
in nature. In the case of human beings designing a
flying machine, it is surely a functional, and probably

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