encompass the ideas of “SEE” and “MAKE”. These focal points have alsobeen described as “visualization” and “fabrication” in the Industrial Design Department at IowaState, and the two parallel the ideas of “digital prototyping” and “real prototyping,” which is alsopart of iterative thinking in design and STEM. Table 1- Inventory of FLEx equipmentThe SEE module primarily involves two sets of virtual reality headsets. One presents a sereneItalian Tuscany Villa Oculus Rift demo, where orientation and navigation in a virtual world isself-directed and non-threatening. A keyboard and mouse augment the headset for movementand orientation around the space in a manner very similar to computer games such as Minecraftwith
capacityfor science, engineering, technology, and mathematics (STEM) MOOC evaluation and research.This project focuses on the following research questions: (1) What constructs contribute tolearners’ behavior in advanced STEM MOOCs? (2) What stakeholder needs inform theirdecisions in offering and designing advanced STEM MOOCs? and (3) What is a contextsensitive, generalizable framework of evaluation for advanced STEM MOOCs? To answer theseresearch questions, we triangulate information from: stakeholder interviews, surveys of learners,and learner analytics.IntroductionMassive open online courses, or MOOCS, have caused much discussion in both media outletsand academic journals. NSF and other funding agencies (e.g., Hewitt Foundation) have
engineeringstudents. Figure 1 shows a marker on the desk that isin the view of the webcam mounted at the top of themonitor. The monitor then displays a top view of thedesk (note the user's hand) along with a virtual 3-Dobject that appears in place of the marker. Theydescribed this approach to augmented reality asessentially being a replacement for typical mouse- Figure 1: Fixed-monitor augmented realitybased control of a simulation. While they did not directly compare this approach to a moretraditional approach, they concluded that theirshort course (16 hours over 2 weeks), whichincluded this technology, did in fact lead to growthin spatial reasoning ability, and that students werepositive about using this technology.In the second category of using
PBLis an appropriate strategy for teaching students to engage in complex problem solving, andindeed may be one of the only effective methods for doing so (Shepherd and Cosgrif, 1998,Tomkinson et al., 2008). The vertically-integrated problem-based learning (PBL) frameworkdeveloped in the course of this TUES project provides undergraduate students with bothknowledge and tools needed to address urban sustainability issues in their future careers, whetherin industry or academe. This framework is replicable and can thus be deployed acrossuniversities as part of the CCEM curriculum. In this TUES project, the researchers develop a problem-based learning framework that (1)introduces sustainability earlier in the undergraduate curriculum, and (2
) and to provide more context around the participant’s access and experienceworking with computers growing up.Intake 1. Please tell me your major and how you came to choose that major. 2. Describe what programming is to you. (a) What does it mean to “be a programmer”? (b) Do you consider yourself a programmer? Why or why not? 3. Describe how programming is integrated into the curriculum in your major. (a) What did you learn from the curricular activities vs. on your own? 4. Tell me about the project you will be working on today. (a) Why did you choose to start it? (b) How long have you been working on it? (c) How often do you work on it? (d) When do you think it will be complete?Outtake 1. Think back
circles or boxes denoting concepts. The linking words and phrases specify relationshipsamong concepts. Two or more concepts are connected by linking words/phrases to form aproposition 12.The present study was funded by an NSF TUES-Type 1 program. An important goal of theproject is to use concept mapping to improve student understanding of the relationships amongdifferent concepts in engineering dynamics. This executive summary reports student perceptionsabout their concept mapping experiences. Innovations of the present study are described,followed by a description of research methods, data collection, example concept maps generatedby students, and student perceptions of concept mapping. Discussions and conclusions are madeat the end of this
. It has similar characteristics tothe early power grid before the smart grid6. The developed system (iAdvise) is inspired by thesmart grid, and the same terminology will be used in this paper. Specifically, in the smart gridthe “operator” term is used to refer to the administration of the smart grid. In this study the termoperator will refer to the department administrators. In the smart grid terminology, the term“agents” is used to refer to the independent user that uses the power grid. In this study it willrefer to the students. Another characteristic of the current advising system is that it has partialinformation without real-time input from the agents as shown in Figure 1. Due to all of thepreviously mentioned characteristics, a large
, 2017 ASEE Safe Zone Workshops and Virtual Community of Practice to Promote LGBTQ Equality in Engineering The results discussed in this paper are part of a transformative project that links diversityresearch with a faculty development initiative to promote LGBTQ equality in engineering. Theaims of the project are to (1) identify aspects of engineering culture that present barriers toLGBTQ equality, (2) build knowledge and skills to disrupt discrimination and promote LGBTQequality in engineering departments on college campuses and (3) to identify best practices forpromoting LGBTQ equality in engineering. Safe Zone is a term commonly used in schools andworkplaces to describe both a learning experience (workshops) as
thelearning process. Today’s educators must embrace the technological evolution if they want to bean effective instructor in this millennium.The rise in the demand for online education has increase yearly. About 5.8 million students wereenrolled in at least one distance learning course in fall 2014 – up 3.9 percent from the previousfall, according to “Online Report Card: tracking Online Education in the United States,” anannual report by the Babson Survey Research Group [1].This fall, our Electronic Technologydegree program will be offered through distance learning to meet the ever pressing demand fordistant learning. In order to scale our online learning offering appropriately, administrators needa better understanding of what is most beneficial for
now calling, The System. The Systemconsisted of four main elements, both listed and shown in figures:1. MSP430 Launchpad Evaluation Kit (see Figure 1),2. Sidekick Basic Kit for TI LaunchPad (see Figure 2),3. Grove Base Booster Pack (see Figure 3), and the4. Grove Starter Kit for Launchpad (see Figure 4). Figure 1. MSP430 Launchpad Evaluation Kit Figure 2. Sidekick Basic Kit Figure 3. Grove Base Booster Pack Figure 4. Grove Starter Kit for LaunchpadStudents spent the first class lesson exploring the different items, their functions, andbrainstorming how things worked. Each student was asked to rate themselves on howcomfortable they felt with coding, using The
facultymembers respond that it is not technical mastery, but “mathematical maturity” that matters. Weconducted a qualitative thematic analysis of 27 interviews with engineering faculty membersfrom 11 disciplines who taught engineering courses that list part of the core engineeringmathematics sequence as a direct prerequisite. We examine which mathematical skills, habits,and attitudes constitute “mathematical maturity” for engineering students according to theseengineering faculty members. We constructed an initial coding scheme from literature onmathematical epistemology, mathematical competencies, and symbol sense, with additionalcodes allowed to emerge during coding by two researchers.Some of the findings of this study are presented here. 1) Faculty
Engineering at the University of Akron (UA) ran aNational Science Foundation funded Research Experience for Teachers (RET) site from 2012-2016 and started a new cycle in 2016-2019. This paper is a summary of the 2012 – 2016 site.The main objective of this RET site was to bring ten high school science teachers to TheUniversity of Akron (UA) campus for eight weeks each summer to increase their knowledge ofengineering research and enable them to effectively disseminate this knowledge in their highschool classrooms. This was accomplished through a combination of (1) an independent researchproject for each teacher in the laboratory of a UA faculty member and (2) hands-on professionaldevelopment activities to reinforce the fundamentals of engineering
among educators about the definition of creativity. Someconsider creativity as the ability to invent, whereas others classify creativity asdivergent thinking or even imagination 1. In short, creativity is the ability to create andto innovate and is a characteristic and an ability of creative people 2, 3. Whenevaluating creativity within education, projects completed by students are usuallyused as the evaluation criterion, and the process, environment, and characteristics ofcreativity themselves are rarely explored or analyzed. Although some studies on thesubject have been performed, the majority have only defined or probed thedevelopment of creative thinking from a single dimension.All current learning management platforms collect digital
and implementing an innovative solution. We analyzed process mapsusing an a priori coding scheme which was modified from a coding scheme that was originallydeveloped to analyze expert-created process maps1. The coding scheme focused on the content ofthe map along two categories: (1) stage of innovation and (2) focus area. Analysis revealed thatstudents identified a majority of components at the opportunity identification (earliest) stage ofinnovation and included a decreasing number of components in each later stage of innovation.Students also emphasized the technological elements of the process, with lesser, but moderate,emphasis on strategic and societal elements.Investigating the Variety of Ways Engineering Students Experience
step of the design process and thus targets particular POED.This course structure is anchored in the experiential learning cycle of David Kolb [1] by thelearning statement, a reflective learning exercise. We provide our course map of the relationshipof the POED to each assignment addressed in this paper in Figure 1. Through course lectures we provide the information and context required for students tocomplete assignments and, through reflection, identify competencies needed as Junior Engineers.Lecture topics range from discussion of the assignments and the POED to design processstrategies and tools. For example, we give a lecture on ‘attention-directing tools,’ which enablestudents to make informed decisions based on qualitative data
Table 1). The surveys probed self-reporteddifferentials in 1) teachers’ confidence in teaching engineering concepts and 2) changes in theirteaching practices as a result of exposure to (and experiences with) K-12 engineering educationresources and outreach opportunities, including the frequency with which they integratedengineering into their classroom teaching. The surveys employed a combination of Likert-style,open-ended, and multiple-choice questions. Table 1: Descriptions of TeachEngineering (TE) impact surveys for three K-12 teacher populations. Survey Population All TeachEngineering.org users from September 27 to TE site pop-up survey
guidingresearch question was: “To what extent can affordances of physical manipulatives be built intovisuo-haptic simulations? We have designed an experiment where students moved objects withdifferent friction on different surfaces. Our study comprised seven students who were promptedwith “what-if” scenarios where they first predicted what they thought might happen, and thentested their predictions by using a physical manipulative setup. We characterized students’interactions using Gaver’s (1991) classification of affordances. Our results suggest a higher levelof student engagement and motivation when using the physical manipulative setup. However,they also show greater confusion about: 1) density vs. weight, 2) mass vs. surface area, and 3)softness vs
encounter during capstone design and willencounter in the real-world. The second goal is to improve assessment of students’ abilities toapply sustainable engineering design concepts across different problems or design challenges.We hypothesize that with guided practice and feedback, engineering undergraduate students willbecome better at drawing upon and integrating diverse knowledge domains when they are facedwith new, complex problems during professional practice. Project work began in September2015 through the NSF Research in Engineering Education program.Cognitive flexibility theory (CFT)1 provides a basis for assessing and improving students’knowledge transfer and the connection-building required to adequately address sustainabilityproblems
the development anduse of problem solving in the context of design, or design thinking skills, has yet to bedetermined.This Works in Progress paper seeks to provide additional insight into the role of knowledgestructure, knowledge retention, and misconceptions in solving open-ended biomedicalengineering design problems. Correlations in problem solving performance to level ofmetacognitive awareness will also be assessed. As part of a larger multidisciplinary study, weseek to develop a model for undergraduates’ STEM problem solving performance that will serveas a tool to guide support of students’ problem solving skill development.Goals and Research QuestionsThe overall goals of this study are to (1) analyze students’ problem solving work in
combined findings from both phases of the study.2. Research Question(s)Mixed-methods research follows from a pragmatic perspective, hence the research questionsguide and determine the entire process such as selection of research design, sample size, and datacollection methods11-13 The research questions for this study are: 1. The overarching research question is: “What is the relationship between engineering students’ programming self-efficacy beliefs and their experience learning computer programming?" 2. The quantitative research question is, “Are there differences in students’ programming self-efficacy beliefs after taking an introductory computer programming course?" 3. The tentative qualitative question is
toprofile the quality of reflection. Table 1 summarizes the dimensions of reflection.Table 1: Summary of Reflection Dimension Attributes. Dimension Attributes Descriptive Problem or concern is identified and described. Comparative Outside perspectives and/or data are gathered to reframe the problem, question assumptions and/or preconceived notions and provide basis for comparison/critique. Evaluative Conclusions are made with a broadened perspective of how teaching impacts the learning environment and how students learn. Decisions to implement a change or to continue with current teaching style
students could bring work from any class in which they might have awriting assignment. The resulting implementation resulted in only 1 or 2 students attending thefirst two sessions, and no attendees at the later sessions. Because of this the workshops weretransitioned to a technical writing module that is completely online within the virtual programspace, allowing participants to complete activities on their own time, consult references asneeded, or contact the PIs with specific questions they may have.A second activity that underwent a trial phase with limited success was a series of studentsuccess workshops. The University’s Center for Academic Achievement offers a series ofstudent success workshops throughout each semester covering topics such
section; the“scientific method” students outperformed “neurotransmission” students on scientific methodquestions, while “neurotransmission” students outperformed “scientific method” students onquestions pertaining to neurotransmission.Research QuestionsBecause creating digital video is not a widely accepted form of communication expected ofundergraduate students, the following research questions were proposed for this study: 1. Does learning differ between students who create media while receiving media- literacy instruction and students who receive media-literacy instruction alone without creating any media? 2. Do “video term-paper” projects and lessons in media literacy improve student
influenced by the existing framework of thepre- and post- tests for the assessment of learning (Dietrich et al, 2015). For both the IntroDBand QueryDB animations, the questions that assess student learning are related to categories ofassessed concepts, which are shown in Table 1 for each animation. Questions range from high-level concepts to specific details in identifying data for answering queries or missing parts of anSQL query. Table 1. Categories of Concepts Assessed in the Two Animations IntroDB Category QueryDB Category Spreadsheet Anomalies Set Operations Database Anomalies (None) Filtering operations Primary Keys
project include investigation of common design patterns, a progression ofstudent experimentation behaviors, and validation studies of a design conceptions instrument.(1) Investigated common patterns of student design behaviors.1 This publication exploredthree protocols to measure students’ engineering design solution quality, taking into account bothobjective and subjective design criteria. We compared high school students’ design solutions andestablished a metric called Trade-Off Value as a way to measure artifact quality. This method ofmeasuring measure artifact quality by focusing on how well a designer has balanced bothcomplementary and competing design criteria provides additional information on an importantdesign behavior and an opportunity
engineering education, and community partnerships in secondary education. c American Society for Engineering Education, 2017 WIP: Examining micro-interventions to improve classroom community in introductory engineering classroomsThe field of engineering education, like many areas in higher education, is steeped in tradition.Engineering departments are known for traditional lecture-style classrooms with highenrollment, particularly at the lower levels, where direct instruction, along with grades basedlargely on a handful of multiple choice exams, are the norm [1]. Introductory courses -- the startof an unforgiving workload -- serve to “weed out” students at an early stage, and typically
example, communication skill development seminars,workshops, and mock interviews were coordinated prior to events like the Engineer Career Fairwhereas visits to local industries were scheduled later in the semester to avoid overlap withmidterm exams and research activities.FindingsThe demographic profile of the participants for each semester is listed in Table 1. During the firstthree years of the program, a total of 29 scholars have been awarded 54 scholarships, with astudent population that is 62% white, 28% African-American, and 10% Hispanic. Within theprogram, there are more males (62%) than females (38%).Table 1: Participants’ Gender and Demographic Profile since the program started. RACE/ ETHNICITY Year 1 Year 2 Year 3
-based instructional practices (i.e.active learning, cooperative learning, think-pair-share, etc.) and opportunities for their inclusion.Following the TLE, sequentially, two additional faculty review the video and are privy to thepre-observation reflection statement, the comments from the TLE, and any other reviews orannotations that preceded their own reviews. The peer reviewers are provided a table ofinstructional attributes, adapted from Berquist and Philips (1975) to guide their review (Table 1).The reviewers are also provided a list of evidence-based instructional practices and theiroperational definitions. Table 1. Table of attributes used to guide peer-review. Instructor’s Organization (The instructor…) presented the material in an
in the next section. Each module has sixcomponents: 1) assigned background material, 2) a list of supplemental resources, 3) a lecturevideo, 4) a faculty conversation video, 5) a multiple choice quiz, and 6) a written discussionassignment. The assigned background material ranges from third party videos describing atechnology in more depth (such as [1]) to scholarly articles discussing related issues (such as[2]), to short stories illustrating relevant issues (such as [3]). A list of supplemental materials isposted along with the assigned background material. This list provides students with a startingpoint to dig further into a desired topic as well as find resources for the course project. Thelecture videos are 20-40 minutes long