Conference Session

FPD11 -- Multidisciplinary Experiences

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Mehrube Mehrubeoglu, Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi; Lifford McLauchlan, Texas A&M University-Kingsville

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

the technicalskills, the students are also expected to develop soft skills that are necessary in the engineeringand technology fields, such as teamwork, ethical and professional responsibilities,communications, and time management, all deemed an integral part of the learning experience,and necessary by the ABET accreditation guidelines.Since introductory courses play an important role in student retention and success, there is a needto generate new ideas and develop creative teaching strategies to ensure student interest,attention and learning. Many groups studied innovative methods to achieve the desiredclassroom goals. The following section reviews some of the relevant findings in the literature.The proposed method and its pilot

Conference Session

FPD3 -- Professional Issues for First-Year Courses

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Karen High, Oklahoma State University; Rebecca Damron, Oklahoma State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

DesignChallenge” was modified in the fall 2006 semester to include an explicit question aboutthe students perspective on the activity: Was the “Airplane Design Challenge” a goodway to learn to understand the similarities and differences between product and processdesign? This question acted as the central idea students could develop through thereflections and definitions traditionally required of the assignment. Dr. High, Dr. Damron(an English faculty member) and another English faculty member assessed the studentsfor critical thinking and writing ability using university-wide assessment rubrics.BackgroundIncreasing attention has been given to the development of what have been called the“soft” skills in engineering, which the recent accreditation