Beginning to as much as you can cover?

[Ponchik]

I was wondering, when you teach a electrical code class for local college, do you teach from the beginning of the code book and cover as much code sections as you can? OR you teach certain sections? Or cover certain sections that are dwelling related or commercial related or .....

Thanks for your comments.

 

[fmtjfw]

I was wondering, when you teach a electrical code class for local college, do you teach from the beginning of the code book and cover as much code sections as you can? OR you teach certain sections? Or cover certain sections that are dwelling related or commercial related or .....

Thanks for your comments.

What is the audience? What are they going to do? I covered ch 1-4 for residential with a very broad brush in about 8 contact hours for some apprentices. It takes about 500 hours to prepare high school students to understand the code and pass the WV Journeyman's test.

 

[iceworm]

... a electrical code class for local college, do you teach from the beginning of the code book and cover as much code sections as you can? OR you teach certain sections? Or cover certain sections that are dwelling related or commercial related or ...

You have to decide on a couple of things:

The mission: For example, is this a class for:

Continuing apprentices to pass the state test?
A 16 hour required continuing education refresher for journeymen?
An 8 hour required continuing education refresher for Masters?
Sizing circuits for Motors, transformers, generators?
Grounding and Bonding?
Electrical Engineering Batchelor of Science?​

The available time is:

8 hours (one day)
16 hours (one weekend)
40 hours (8 hours, 5 days)
40 hours (2 hours, 2 night a week, 10 weeks - one of several)
4800 hours (8 hours, 5 days/week, 40 weeks/year, 4 Years)​

Once you figure this out, you wil know exactly what to cover.

ice

 

[brad9m]

If you are teaching for EE majors that are looking to get their PE, I would use NCEES as a reference:

http://ncees.org/exams/pe-exam/

 

[K8MHZ]

I would suggest teaching how to use the code book more than I would try to teach what is in it. The content will change every three years, but the format is much more stable.

In my apprenticeship, they taught the 'design, build, use' method which I think sucks. I did it my own way (I have been dealing with reference books for years) which involves keywords and using the index and table of contents to find my way around. It must have worked, my scores were better than any of the other 40 in my class.

Which ever way works the best for the students, support it. A person that is fast and accurate at finding code entries is far more valuable than one that memorized the entire code book.

The book is not meant to be a design manual. It is a rule book. Teaching the math about why we use a certain size breaker should not be part of a code class, it should be part of an engineering class. Teaching how to find out what the NEC sets as the minimum is of utmost importance. Once that skill is attained, it can be applied to all upcoming code books.

Take a look at a 93 code book. How much info is in there compared to today's and how many changes have been made? But I could use the 93 book to teach a person to navigate and they would be able to pick up a 2012 and find answers to their questions.

 

[PEDRO ESCOVILLA]

i agree, teach how to use it first. i taught apprenticeship classes for a couple years. the first asignment i gave my students was to go thru the book and write out every article number and its title. they thoutght i was nuts, but they new where to find stuff the next time around. there a ton of info in the codes, and you cant teach everybody everything they will need to know. math, like was said before, it depends on their purpose and end use.

 

[Ponchik]

Thanks for all of your input.
I always start out with the basic lay out and the purpose of the book. The class is a mix of experienced electricians and completely off the street students and some that are in the middle, which makes it difficult to decide what to teach. you want to satisfy all parties.

I think i will try something new next semester.

i like your idea of writing down of the code articles.

 

[mlnk]

For a beginner, the Code seems to be written in a different language.
In my community college basic electricity A class, I taught the basic ideas of how elec wiring works with emphasis on the language used in the NEC. I use lots of equipment and props. I could not find a suitable text, so I wrote my own, about 300 pages long.
By the end of the class, the students are ready to read the Code directly.
Teaching how to look stuff up is a great idea, if the student can understand what they have looked up.

 

[73cj5]

I teach codeology first with an emphasis in the plan/build/use and key words.

This is for 2nd year apprentices.

The free code quizzes I use at the end of class to let them leave one at a time

Try and make it fun, if not it will be a long class........

 

[ggunn]

Is there a version (pdf, maybe?) of the NEC that one can install on an iPad or other tablet device? It sure would be nice to be able to search via keywords in software.