Teaching Technical Writing:  Opportunities for International Collaboration

Seawright, Leslie

doi:10.3991/ijep.v4i2.3438

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…Unlike cross-cultural exchanges that require students to work in teams and produce a document, analysis, or review (Du-Babcock & Varner, 2008;Seawright, 2014;Starke-Meyerring & Andrews, 2006), this study asked only for students to get to know one another. This project allowed students to devote their time to learning about the lives of their group members rather than concentrating on producing a school assignment.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Building Cultural Competence and Changing Cultural Perceptions: Students from the UAE and USA Participate in a Cultural Exchange Project

Seawright¹,

Albers²,

Schanne³

2021

Bus. Commun. Res. Pract.

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Objectives: Cultural competence is a skill that is lauded and encouraged in today's business communication programs and in industry. The problem becomes, how and when do instructors introduce students to meaningful intercultural exchanges that produce the skills and awareness students will need in the future. The instructors in this study wanted a low-cost, student-center program or assignment to introduce students to intercultural communication through actual practice. The project needed to help students become more culturally aware and culturally competent. Methods: The authors of this study paired their students for a virtual cross-cultural exchange for a period of 8 weeks. Students from the United States of America (USA) and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) spent several weeks corresponding via the text messaging application, WhatsApp, in order to learn more about the other's culture and customs. Surveys intended to measure cultural awareness and cultural competence were taken by students prior to the start of the exchange and again at its conclusion. Results: The survey results show an increase in cultural awareness and cultural competence correlated to the cultural exchange project. Conclusions: Instructors can create low-cost, interactive opportunities for students to improve cultural awareness and competence through online conversations and cultural exchanges with students of various cultures in different locales and countries.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Building Cultural Competence and Changing Cultural Perceptions: Students from the UAE and USA Participate in a Cultural Exchange Project

Seawright¹,

Albers²,

Schanne³

2021

Bus. Commun. Res. Pract.

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“…For example, in Seawright's work with the Texas A&M University's Qatar site 9 , a technical writing opportunity was used to facilitate education in collaboration. Lessons learned from this particular paper include the importance of deliverables Page 26.928.3…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving Students’ Technical Writing Skills: Abstracts in Introductory Solid Mechanics

Chew¹,

Turpin²

2015 ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition Proceedings

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IntroductionTechnical writing is an important skill for students to develop by the time of graduation, and effective communication is required of the ABET 2009-10 Criterion 3. In addition to ABET requirement, the industry demand for skilled technical writers is increasing 6 . However, for many engineering students, the act of technical writing can be intimidating. This is especially true if the students are still learning about the topic in question 6 . More exposure to the subject matter is useful in making technical writing a less daunting task. Students need significant practice to become effective communicators upon completion of their degrees. Beginning this education in technical writing early allows students maximizes time spent learning to communicating effectively and efficiently. Much work has been done to investigate the effect of interventions in upperclassmen capstone courses (see bibliography). Additionally, courses which integrate writing and project design instruction are becoming increasingly common 6,8 . This interdisciplinary combination has the potential to give students an experience in technical writing and engineering design closer to that practiced outside of an academic setting 8 .For this paper, the researchers examined the effect of instructional interventions on early engineering students, primarily freshmen and sophomores. The course in question is ENGR 14: Introduction to Solid Mechanics. This is a prerequisite course for many higher level engineering classes which combines communication, project based learning, and technical writing. . There are two longer writing assignments in the course; the assignment we have focused our research on is the second project, P2. This assignment required students to design their own statics research question, solve the problem using topics covered in Introduction to Solid Mechanics, and complete a written summary. This written summary contains an abstract, free body diagrams, final calculations, and a poster presentation. The purpose of the project is to give students experience in designing their own problem and solving it, writing a professional technical paper, and class presentation.The questions that this research seeks to answer are:1. How did the changes in the assignment worksheet affect student work in terms of clear technical writing? 2. What could be added or changed about the assignment to maximize student performance? 3. How will these ideas be implemented for future quarters?This research adds new information to the existing literature because it examines the effect of instruction in technical writing through a project that is not a capstone design course nor requires students to design a working model within certain constraints. BackgroundDesign projects involving technical writing in engineering courses have the potential to provide a learning platform for other essential skills. For example, in Seawright's work with the Texas A&M University's Qatar site 9 , a technical writing opportunity was used to facilitate education in collabo...

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Integrating Team-Based Learning Modules to Improve Civil Engineering Students’ Technical Writing Skills

Zha

Mattson

2020

J. Civ. Eng. Educ.

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Teaching Technical Writing: Opportunities for International Collaboration

Cited by 3 publications

References 5 publications

Building Cultural Competence and Changing Cultural Perceptions: Students from the UAE and USA Participate in a Cultural Exchange Project

Building Cultural Competence and Changing Cultural Perceptions: Students from the UAE and USA Participate in a Cultural Exchange Project

Improving Students’ Technical Writing Skills: Abstracts in Introductory Solid Mechanics

Integrating Team-Based Learning Modules to Improve Civil Engineering Students’ Technical Writing Skills

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