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Integrating Student Experience into the Classroom

Abstract

Engineering educators seek to inspire their students to integrate classroom theories with their own experience. This paper describes the development of an activity integrating co-op experiences and/or research interests with classroom learning. The resulting instrument, CITIES – Beyond the Classroom, will be useful for STEM educators to create a participative classroom environment. The instrument may be adapted for facilitation in diverse classes. An overview of the CITIES instrument and preparatory materials as well as preliminary assessment of the instrument will be presented.

The purpose of this instrument is to develop a student activity that connects classroom work with contemporary issues and real-world applications. Using a methodology based on expert performance, students will analyze class concepts through the exposure and acquisition of new information from a variety of resources. They will describe to others what they have learned, and assess their own communication skills through a quiz that they develop themselves. The principle student activity is an oral presentation communicating information, applications and citations, but the real value in the methodology is that it jump-starts the novice toward the approach experts would use in preparing a presentation.

CITIES is an acronym that describes the intent of the exercise: Contemporary Issues That Impact Engineering Solutions. It may be modified for use in classes outside of engineering with a slight modification to Contemporary Issues That Inspire Extraordinary Solutions. Regardless of the context in which it is used, the CITIES instrument provides a step-by-step method to take classroom concepts and apply them to real-world applications. The focus of this instrument is to guide both the instructor and the students in a more structured environment than simply assigning presentations on topics with applications. To support the meta-level process, the instrument contains preparatory information for the instructor and the student handout. The CITIES methodology was created as part of a Pacific Crest Teaching Institute.

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a tool that can be used in many courses to draw upon experiences beyond the classroom, and bring outside interests into the discussion of course topics.

In the contemporary education environment, there is a need to incorporate more activities that emphasize relevance and professional practice in the STEM classroom.4 This tool provides an activity that engages students in the preparation of a professional presentation, and inspires them to think more broadly about a classroom topic by exploring applications connected to their interests and/or experience.

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Lynch-Caris, T., & Ludwigsen, D. (2009, June), Integrating Student Experience Into The Classroom Paper presented at 2009 Annual Conference & Exposition, Austin, Texas. 10.18260/1-2--4777