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Session 2793

Innovative Approaches to first year engineering education.

Monique Osborn, Dilip Nag

Faculty of Education Monash University Australia/Faculty of Engineering Monash University Australia.

ABSTRACT The moment students have enrolled into an undergraduate engineering study program a number of expectations have already been placed upon them. It is often assumed that these students enter tertiary education with a wide variety of study skills and abilities. The majority of engineering educators also assume that each student has a similar learning style that is compatible to their teaching style. An extensive pilot study conducted at Monash University has indicated that these assumptions contribute to a low retention rate and instil shallow learning. It was found that the success of quality learning and teaching is very much dependent upon the manner in which life learning skills based on Maslow’s Hierachy of Needs and Bloom’s Taxonomy of Thinking are integrated into the course. This paper discusses these factors in detail and suggests the reasons for their incorporation into first year engineering education.

INTRODUCTION

Ultimately, the quality of student learning is influenced by the lecturers’ understanding of what it means to teach (1). Currently, the concept of learning and teaching for Australian tertiary students and their educators has been gradually moving away from a transmission approach to that of constructivism. Therefore it is important to recognise that a learner will individually construct and reconstruct meaning for purposeful understanding. No longer is it satisfactory for educators to assume that learning has occurred ‘en masse’ simply because the content has been delivered. Unfortunately, this has been a longstanding, strong traditional culture whereby knowledge has been considered sacred and that learning has been controlled, objective and efficient (2). Generally academics are beginning to believe that effective learning must involve appropriate problem solving related activities, however, it appears that the transmission of information continues to be the most favoured teaching approach, because of a reluctance to change. Yet ironically academics expect that students will constructively process the given information. Consequently this paper discusses the effective teaching practices employed by those engineering academics at Monash University Gippsland campus working with all first year undergraduates in a common civil engineering unit. A series of research projects have enabled the identification of transition issues and an increasing attrition rate, influenced by maligned teaching and learning practices (3).

“Proceedings of the 2002 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright©2002, American Society for Engineering Education

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Osborn, M., & Nag, D. (2002, June), Innovative Approaches To First Year Engineering Education Paper presented at 2002 Annual Conference, Montreal, Canada. 10.18260/1-2--10220