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

协作学习是基于知识是一种社会建构的观点。研究表明，积极和社交的教育经历会导致更深入的学习，更高层次的思维和对不同观点的理解的增加。工程系统和控制教育中的小组学习项目通过开发小组学习活动和相关的教学材料，解决了工程教师采用协作学习方法的障碍。学习活动将由来自不同高等教育机构的教师共同开发。这个项目的智力价值有三个方面：它发展了小组课堂活动，使学生能够可视化抽象概念；它进行了一个横断面案例研究，并为几所学院和大学提供了相关数据，使我们能够研究工程课堂上小组学习的教育成果；它确定并解决了教师在改造课堂教学法时所面临的资源和时间有限的问题。该项目将开发和传播课堂教学活动，通过研讨会、教师参与者对许多不同学院和大学的课程提供的活动进行评估、评估结果、以及通过工程课程更广泛地传播方法的规划来补充教学指导。研讨会的参与者是代表学院和大学的工程学院，这些学院和大学的本科课程服务于传统学生、非传统学生（有家庭和工作的年长学生）、未被充分代表的少数民族、妇女或计划参军的学生。因此，这些活动和成果将通过这些学院提供的工程教育影响大量学生。通过项目活动开发的材料将以开源文件、设计、说明、视频和课程计划的形式传播，利用课堂内的小组活动产生超出参与者所在机构的影响。

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.