A Comparative Assessment of Students'Experiences in Two Instructional Formats of an Introductory Materials Science Course

Abstract

An educational experiment at Worcester Polytechnic Institute is described in which the instruction of the Introduction to MaterialsScience course (ES2001) was modified to incorporate active and cooperative learning. The overall goal was simultaneously to enhance educational quality and faculty productivity. Aspects of the course modification included use of "active" rather than traditional lectures, assignment of students to cooperative learning teams, introduction of a "product dissection project," and a "teacher as manager" approach to instruction, in which undergraduate Peer Learning Assistants and the graduate Teaching Assistant took on responsibilities as part of the instructional team. Data were gathered from 382 students in three traditional course offerings and two active/cooperative offerings, using various survey instruments to measure students' learning and performance, attitudes about learning, interest in materials science, and their satisfaction with the course. natural tendency to be spectators and fortified any pre-existing "teach me" attitudes rather than cultivating intellectual curiosity and self-led learning. Indeed, research has shown that the exclusive use of lecturing in the classroom constrains students' learning. 3 Another important driving force for the course modification was our conviction, shared by employers' of new engineering graduates and others, 6,7 that developing students' "softer" skills-their communication and interpersonal skills, desire to learn, and confidence in their ability to do so-is as important as ensuring their technical competence. Furthermore, we believe that attention to communication and teamwork skills can and should be considered in the context of every engineering course to avoid "compartmentalization of knowledge." 8 An additional consideration in the redesign of ES2001 was course staffing as it affects faculty productivity. In recent years, lectures have been supplemented by weekly recitation section meetings to create opportunities for group discussion that were lost due to larger class sizes. These weekly problem solving and question-andanswer sessions are typically staffed by four materials science and engineering (MTE) faculty members, some of whom spend not insignificant time preparing for these section meetings. Our feeling was that faculty productivity, as well as student learning, potentially could be enhanced by utilizing undergraduate and graduate students as part of the instructional team in lieu of the faculty recitation instructors. Furthermore, this "teacher as manager" approach could improve the productivity of the primary faculty instructor.The objectives and desired outcomes for the modified instructional format of ES2001 are summarized in Table 1. In this paper we report details of how the course was redesigned to meet these objectives, along with results of our comparative assessment of students' experiences in the two course formats.

Development of a web‐based integrated manufacturing laboratory

“…It should be noted that both intellectual and physical activities are needed in order to anchor engineering knowledge and practice in the minds of students. It should also be recognized that developing students' softer skillsÐtheir communication and interpersonal skills, desire to learn, and con®dence in their ability to do soÐis as important as ensuring their technical competence [12]. Therefore, a successful manufacturing education strategy should address the effective use of information technology, laboratory experience, and collaborative learning.…”

“…Demetry and Groccia [12] pointed out that the exclusive use of lectures had created a passive learning environment that reinforced students' natural tendency to be spectators. This forti®ed any pre-existing``teach me'' attitudes rather than cultivating intellectual curiosity and self-led learning.…”

A Cost‐Effectiveness Model for the Assessment of Educational Productivity

“…An additional weekly conference session was led by graduate TAs Miller and Groccia, 1997). In engineering and computer science courses (Demetry and Groccia, 1997;DiBiasio and Groccia, 1995;Hart and Groccia, 1994;Wills and Finkel, 1994), it was typical for PLAs to meet with groups of students to facilitate the solution of weekly problem sets, longer-term group projects, and laboratory exercises, although biology was the only instance of such a radical reorganization as having the major course activity be large-group projects. In mathematics (Davis, 1994a(Davis, , 1994b, PLAs led conference sessions of about twelve students, with the objective of reinforcing lecture material and assisting with problem solving.…”

A novel approach to integrating design into manufacturing and materials education through the fabrication of a scale model cannon

“…This approach has also been modified for application with topics such as materials and manufacturing and introduced at later periods in students' development 8 . Qualitative assessment of these integrated approaches as compared with more traditional formats has already been done 9 . What remained was integration of these approaches within a laboratory format and more specifically to find if students could achieve a greater level of knowledge under this modified format than the existing one.…”