Improving Learning in Engineering Classrooms by Coupling Interactive Simulations and Real-Time Formative Assessment via Pen-Enabled Mobile Technology

这个工程教育研究项目旨在将现成的仿真工具与各种主动学习教学法相结合，以教授工程概念。这个项目的一个独特之处在于使用平板电脑，允许学生以定性的方式实时解释概念，从而允许内容专家快速进行形成性评估。该项目将在几个工程课程中试点这项创新，并解决将该技术扩展到更大班级的问题。对工程误解的基本见解可能会从这个项目中产生，等待对生成的大量学生工件的成功评估。这个项目更广泛的意义和重要性是允许更好地利用现有的基于计算机的仿真工具来教授工程学生概念内容。开发的教学方法将在有大量女学生的班级以及少数民族学生的暑期班进行试点，这些学生在STEM学科中往往代表性不足。将研究教学技术在大型教室中的可扩展性，以更广泛地传播创新。

This engineering education research project seeks to integrate readily available simulation tools with a variety of active learning pedagogies to teach engineering concepts. A unique feature of this project is to use tablet computers to permit students to explain concepts in a qualitative manner in real time, thus allowing rapid formative assessment by content experts. The project will pilot the innovation in several engineering classes and address issues of scaling the technique to larger class sizes. Fundamental insights on engineering misconceptions may arise from this project pending successful evaluation of the large number of student artifacts generated.The broader significance and importance of this project is to allow better use of existing computer-based simulation tools for teaching conceptual content to engineering students. The teaching methods developed will be piloted in classes with a large number of female students, who are often under-represented in STEM disciplines, as well as summer classes for minority students. The scalability of the teaching techniques to large classrooms will be investigated to more broadly disseminate the innovations.