Developing a Curiosity Mindset in Engineering Undergraduates via Hands-On, Inquiry-Based Learning Activities with Hidden Discoveries

Nathan Delson; James Lynch

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Conference: 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Baltimore , Maryland
Publication Date: June 25, 2023
Start Date: June 25, 2023
End Date: June 28, 2023
Conference Session: Mechanical Engineering Division (MECH) Technical Session 10: Capstone and Design Education
Tagged Division: Mechanical Engineering Division (MECH)
Page Count: 13
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--43031
Permanent URL: https://sftp.asee.org/43031
Download Count: 131

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Paper Authors

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Nathan Delson University of California at San Diego

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Nathan Delson, Ph.D. is a Senior Teaching Professor at the University of California at San Diego. He received a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and his interests include robotics, biomedical devices, product design, engineering education, and maker spaces. In 1999 he co-founded Coactive Drive Corporation (currently General Vibration), a company that provides force feedback solutions. In 2016 Nate co-founded eGrove Education an educational software company focused on teaching sketching and spatial visualization skills.

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James Lynch University of California at San Diego

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I am a 6th-year PhD candidate at UC San Diego in Mechanical Engineering. My research interests are in bio-inspired robotics, flying insect biomechanics, and nonlinear dynamics. I am also passionate about engineering education, having helped develop elements of the Mechanical Engineering Senior Design series over 3 years as a teaching assistant.

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Abstract

Developing a Curiosity Mindset in Engineering Undergraduates Via Hands-On, Inquiry-Based Learning Activities with Hidden Discoveries

In a world full of rapidly developing new technologies, it is critical that engineers develop their sense of curiosity so that they are prepared - and excited - to continue to learn throughout their careers. An engineer who is curious about technology will be intrinsically motivated to engage in life-long learning. Indeed, it is an ABET requirement that engineering students recognize the need for life-long learning, but in addition to recognizing this need we wished to increase the likelihood for engineers to indeed engage in a life-long activity throughout their careers. Accordingly, to promote intrinsic motivation for life-long learning, we developed a series of inquiry-based activities promoting curiosity in an upper-division mechanical engineering senior design course. Our method includes three components. First, we explicitly introduced the value of curiosity in engineering and created assignments that prevented students from treating lab components as a “black boxes”, but rather required understanding of how they work. The second method was mechanical dissection, where students took apart and discovered how a gearbox, encoder, and potentiometer worked. In the third method, students are challenged to discover a “hidden” factor that will improve their theoretical model to better match with experimental results. This upper division design class with 131 students, and students were surveyed at the beginning of the class, and after the curiosity focused activities in week 6. The survey showed that after the class exercises 83% of the students were somewhat or much more interested in using theory in engineering design, 79% were somewhat or much more interested in understanding the physics of how things work, and 76% of the students were somewhat or much more inclined to take things apart. Demographic differences were observed. More than twice as many students from Under-Represented Minorities (URMs) had not taken anything apart prior to the class; 40% for URM students vs 18% for non-URM students. In terms of gender, 30% of female students compared to 20% of the male students had not taken any objects apart prior to the class. Discovering the hidden factor proved to be a challenging yet rewarding activity; only 35% of the students discovered the challenge on their own, but overall, 83% did discover the challenges with help from other students. Student comments expressed how inquiry-based activities promoting curiosity are valued by students.

Citation
Format

Delson, N., & Lynch, J. (2023, June), Developing a Curiosity Mindset in Engineering Undergraduates via Hands-On, Inquiry-Based Learning Activities with Hidden Discoveries Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--43031

TY - CPAPER
AB - Developing a Curiosity Mindset in Engineering Undergraduates Via Hands-On, Inquiry-Based Learning Activities with Hidden Discoveries

In a world full of rapidly developing new technologies, it is critical that engineers develop their sense of curiosity so that they are prepared - and excited - to continue to learn throughout their careers. An engineer who is curious about technology will be intrinsically motivated to engage in life-long learning. Indeed, it is an ABET requirement that engineering students recognize the need for life-long learning, but in addition to recognizing this need we wished to increase the likelihood for engineers to indeed engage in a life-long activity throughout their careers. Accordingly, to promote intrinsic motivation for life-long learning, we developed a series of inquiry-based activities promoting curiosity in an upper-division mechanical engineering senior design course. Our method includes three components. First, we explicitly introduced the value of curiosity in engineering and created assignments that prevented students from treating lab components as a “black boxes”, but rather required understanding of how they work. The second method was mechanical dissection, where students took apart and discovered how a gearbox, encoder, and potentiometer worked. In the third method, students are challenged to discover a “hidden” factor that will improve their theoretical model to better match with experimental results. This upper division design class with 131 students, and students were surveyed at the beginning of the class, and after the curiosity focused activities in week 6. The survey showed that after the class exercises 83% of the students were somewhat or much more interested in using theory in engineering design, 79% were somewhat or much more interested in understanding the physics of how things work, and 76% of the students were somewhat or much more inclined to take things apart. Demographic differences were observed. More than twice as many students from Under-Represented Minorities (URMs) had not taken anything apart prior to the class; 40% for URM students vs 18% for non-URM students. In terms of gender, 30% of female students compared to 20% of the male students had not taken any objects apart prior to the class. Discovering the hidden factor proved to be a challenging yet rewarding activity; only 35% of the students discovered the challenge on their own, but overall, 83% did discover the challenges with help from other students. Student comments expressed how inquiry-based activities promoting curiosity are valued by students.
AU - Nathan Delson
AU - James Lynch
CY - Baltimore , Maryland
DA - 2023/06/25
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Developing a Curiosity Mindset in Engineering Undergraduates via Hands-On, Inquiry-Based Learning Activities with Hidden Discoveries
UR - https://sftp.asee.org/43031
DO - 10.18260/1-2--43031
ER -