Improve Technical Communication Using Scaffolding Method in Mechanical Engineering Courses

Mohammad Abu Rafe Biswas; Aws AlShalash

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Conference: 2021 Fall ASEE Middle Atlantic Section Meeting
Location: Virtually Hosted by the section
Publication Date: November 12, 2021
Start Date: November 12, 2021
End Date: November 13, 2021
Page Count: 11
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--38435
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/38435
Download Count: 227

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Paper Authors

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Mohammad Abu Rafe Biswas The University of Texas at Tyler orcid.org/0000-0002-4077-7979

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Dr. Mohammad (Rafe) Biswas is an Associate Professor at the University of Texas at Tyler Houston Engineering Center in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. His expertise and interests include process dynamics and control, fuel cell systems and thermal fluid engineering education. He has taught courses in system dynamics and control, process control, energy conversion, and thermal fluids laboratory. He also has advised and mentored several senior design project and research students.

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Aws AlShalash

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Abstract

One of the most effective and well documented ways, throughout literary sources, to educate and develop capable and independent professionals such as engineers combines lecture sessions with step-by-step synergistic activities (experiments and reports). Therefore, many engineering educators are seeking experiential learning techniques and implementations that are innovative to assist students understand, exercise, and communicate engineering concepts they learned. Although project-based learning allows students to be able to deduce and apply concepts effectively, students continue to struggle to communicate their work and results effectively from such experiential learning and other projects. Thus, to overcome the deficiencies in writing skills such as poor grammar and formatting, and effective literature review in reports, an instructional scaffolding plan has been developed and implemented in two junior level courses in parallel (Mechanical System Design and Thermal Fluid Laboratory course). The scaffold activities include incremental class activities and assignments as well as access to support resources. The scaffolding activities in the instructional plan will allow students to develop confidence from completing shorter and targeted assignments successfully earlier in the semester as they build their report for more complex and involve analysis and writing activities over the semester. The initially collected data for the two courses show above average performance based on student surveys before and after the scaffolding activities. This reflects an indirect assessment where students share their opinion of themselves. The collected data on direct assessment shows incremental improvement in performance of students based on relevant assignments completed in the courses. Additional assessments will be conducted in future offerings as well as other courses including Dynamics of Machinery, Measurement and Instrumentation, and System Dynamics and Control as part of an ongoing study. Although these are preliminary findings, such pedagogical technique has the potential to enhance the student learning experience and develop mindset to continue their life-long learning in their professional careers.

Citation
Format

Biswas, M. A. R., & AlShalash, A. (2021, November), Improve Technical Communication Using Scaffolding Method in Mechanical Engineering Courses Paper presented at 2021 Fall ASEE Middle Atlantic Section Meeting, Virtually Hosted by the section. 10.18260/1-2--38435

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - One of the most effective and well documented ways, throughout literary sources, to educate and develop capable and independent professionals such as engineers combines lecture sessions with step-by-step synergistic activities (experiments and reports). Therefore, many engineering educators are seeking experiential learning techniques and implementations that are innovative to assist students understand, exercise, and communicate engineering concepts they learned. Although project-based learning allows students to be able to deduce and apply concepts effectively, students continue to struggle to communicate their work and results effectively from such experiential learning and other projects. Thus, to overcome the deficiencies in writing skills such as poor grammar and formatting, and effective literature review in reports, an instructional scaffolding plan has been developed and implemented in two junior level courses in parallel (Mechanical System Design and Thermal Fluid Laboratory course). The scaffold activities include incremental class activities and assignments as well as access to support resources. The scaffolding activities in the instructional plan will allow students to develop confidence from completing shorter and targeted assignments successfully earlier in the semester as they build their report for more complex and involve analysis and writing activities over the semester. The initially collected data for the two courses show above average performance based on student surveys before and after the scaffolding activities.  This reflects an indirect assessment where students share their opinion of themselves. The collected data on direct assessment shows incremental improvement in performance of students based on relevant assignments completed in the courses. Additional assessments will be conducted in future offerings as well as other courses including Dynamics of Machinery, Measurement and Instrumentation, and System Dynamics and Control as part of an ongoing study. Although these are preliminary findings, such pedagogical technique has the potential to enhance the student learning experience and develop mindset to continue their life-long learning in their professional careers.
AU  - Mohammad Abu Rafe Biswas
AU  - Aws AlShalash
CY  - Virtually Hosted by the section
DA  - 2021/11/12
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Improve Technical Communication Using Scaffolding Method in Mechanical Engineering Courses
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/38435
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--38435
ER  -