PD Led Workshops – Session B: Transforming Undergraduate Education in Engineering

1. PD Led Workshops – Session B:Transforming Undergraduate EducationinEngineering Louis Everett Susan Finger Don Millard Russ Pimmel Janis Terpenny Zhanjing (John) Yu 0

2. AGENDA • These are good things • Research based methods • Theoretical foundations • BUT … what does this mean? • Research is extensive, technical, out of reach of some practitioners • Enter the National Academies • They understand our problem • “How People Learn” • Today we will walk you through a small piece of this work 2

3. ACTIVITY 1 • As an individual, take 1 minute to list a few research findings on how people learn • Form a team of those at your table and in your team • Take 5 minutes to introduce yourselves • Take 5 minutes to create a list of research findings related to how people learn • Report back 15

4. Key Findings • Students come with preconceptions • If initial understanding is ignored • may fail to grasp new concepts and information • may “memorize” for a test but revert outside class • To develop competence one must have: • A deep foundation of knowledge (large data set) • A conceptual framework for facts (interrelate ideas) • An organizational structure for retrieval (ready access) • Students should think about their thinking • “Metacognitive” skills help students control learning • Students should define learning goals and monitor progress 20

5. Time Out! • For 3 minutes, as a team, find a suitable definition for METACOGNITION 25

6. ACTIVITY 2 • As an individual, take 1 minuteto list key teaching strategies for accommodating how people learn • As a team • For 5 minutes, list as many pedagogies (a.k.a. Correct instructional strategies) that address these findings • Preconceptions • Deep information • Conceptual framework • Organization • Metacognition • Report out 35

7. Teaching Implications • Teachers must draw out pre-existing concepts • Be familiar with predictable preconceptions • Recognize and draw out unpredicted preconceptions • Work WITH preconceptions so students • Build on them, • Challenge them, • Replace faulty concepts • Use formative assessment to make students aware of their thinking 40

8. Teaching Implications 2 • Teach fewer topics in greater depth • (less is more) • Provide many examples of the concept • (practice) • Teachers must also be in-depth learners • (model behavior) • Assessment must test deep understanding • may require new methods • Develop independent learners • teachmetacognitive skills integrated into the curriculum 45

9. ACTIVITY 3 • Consider a current course or project • For 3 minutes, list current or potential activities that address these teaching pedagogies: • Identifying and working through preconceptions • Creating formative assessments • Covering less but in more depth • Developing metacognitive skills 48

10. ACTIVITY 4 - Summarize • For the same project spend 5 minutes to: • Create a list of activities you can do to: • Disseminate (get others to use) the ideas where you are strong • Strengthen your areas of weakness • List ideas you can share 53

11. Other Topics From How People Learn • How experts differ from novices • Learning and transfer • Mind and brain • Designing Learning environments • Teacher learning • Technology • … J. D. Bransford, A. Brown, and R. Cocking. How people learn: Mind, brain, experience, and school. Washington, DC: National Research Council, 1999. Available from many sources from $15.80 58

12. Conclusions • Please reflect on what you have heard (learned?) • Share your reflections (criticism praise) with us. Questions ? 75

13. Use of Technology • Help bring exciting curricula based on real-world problems into the classroom • Provide scaffolding and tools to enhance learning • Give students and teachers opportunities for feedback, reflection, and revision • Build local/global communities that include teachers, administrators, students, parents, practicing engineers/scientists • Expand opportunities for teacher learning