Engaged student learning - Exploration and Design: Small group learning in engineering systems and control education

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Collaborative learning is based on the view that knowledge is a social construct. Research shows that educational experiences that are active and social lead to deeper learning, higher level thinking and an increase in understanding of diverse perspectives. The Small Group Learning in Engineering Systems and Control Education project addresses barriers to the adoption of collaborative learning methods by engineering instructors through the development of small group learning activities and associated instructional materials. The learning activities will be developed collectively by a faculty from diverse institutions of higher education. The intellectual merit of this project is threefold: it develops small-group classroom activities that enable students to visualize abstract concepts; it conducts a cross-sectional case study and provides associated data for several colleges and universities that allows us to study educational outcomes of small-group learning in the engineering classroom; and it identifies and addresses the problems that instructors face regarding limited resources and time required to revamp classroom pedagogy. The project will develop and disseminate classroom instructional activities that complement didactic instruction through workshops, evaluation of activities over course offerings across many different colleges and universities by faculty participants, assessing outcomes, and planning for broader dissemination of approaches through the engineering curriculum. Workshop participants are engineering faculty representing colleges and universities whose undergraduate programs serve and include a mix of traditional students, non-traditional students (older students with families and jobs), underrepresented minorities, women, or students who plan to enter military service. As such, the activities and outcomes will impact a large cross-section of students through the engineering education offered by these colleges. Materials developed through project activities will be disseminated as open-source documents, designs, instructions, videos, and lesson plans for using small group activities within the classroom to generate impact beyond the participants' institutions.