Collaborative Research: Research: Understanding and Scaffolding the Productive Beginnings of Engineering Judgment in Undergraduate Students

工科本科学生所修的大部分课程都是“工程科学”课程，介绍基础工程概念和公式。然而，在这些课程中，学生通常会完成定义明确的“教科书”问题，这些问题只有一个正确答案。他们没有很多机会将这些概念应用于像实践工程师解决的那些定义不清、复杂、开放式的问题。对于开放式问题，核心工程工作不是找到答案，而是决定如何用数学方法表示（即“建模”）系统，以便对其进行分析。工程师的这些建模技巧被称为“工程判断”。学生需要在整个教育过程中有机会学习和实践工程判断，从他们第一次学习这些基本概念的工程科学课程开始。该项目有两个综合目标——开发一种新型的作业，并在此背景下进行学习科学研究——这将促进学生作为工程师的专业形成。正在开发的新作业被称为开放式建模问题，通过要求学生为一个复杂的现实世界系统建模，让他们有机会练习工程判断。与此作业发展交织在一起的是深入研究学生如何以类似于实践工程师的方式展示工程判断-只是在本科水平。这项研究将为开放式建模问题的结构和实现提供信息，并将产生关于学生如何解决开放式问题的一般化知识。该项目将由一个由工程教育研究人员和工程教师组成的研究小组进行，他们将合作开发、实施和研究开放式建模问题。解决工作场所问题的工程师使用数学模型来分析现实世界中的物理现象，并设计问题的解决方案。在构建数学模型时，工程师使用判断来做出假设，简化现实世界的特征，并评估模型输出的合理性。虽然工程判断是工程实践的必要条件，但工科学生在学校很少进行实践或从事判断。学生通常不会有机会解决不明确的问题，这些问题需要培养判断的使用，直到他们的顶点设计课程。该项目旨在调查新手工程师（学生）在有机会解决定义不清的动力学和热力学问题时如何做出建模判断。它采用基于设计的研究方法来产生基础工程教育研究知识和循证教学改革。本项目将使用建构主义扎根理论方法来识别学生的紧急判断技能，并描述工程判断的生产性开端（RQ1：本科工程专业学生以何种方式显示工程判断的生产性开端？）该项目的研究成果将有助训练工程学生解决更复杂的问题，并为他们在工程实践中解决问题做好准备。该项目还将研究如何创建脚手架指导方针，以帮助教师开发问题，为学生提供练习判断的机会（RQ2：什么样的作业脚手架支持学生发展工程判断的生产性开端？），并帮助他们认识学生思考和工作中的判断（RQ3：什么样的作业脚手架使学生的工程判断的生产性开端对教师可见？）。研究小组将使用访谈、小组讨论、学生作业和调查来三角测量研究结果。这项研究将产生一个框架的生产工程判断的开端；从研究到实践的写作指南，分配，促进和评分开放式建模问题；学生作业和学生话语的例子说明了工程判断的富有成效的开端。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Most of the courses that undergraduate engineering students take are “engineering science” courses that present foundational engineering concepts and formulas. However, in these classes students typically complete well-defined “textbook” problems that only have one correct answer. They do not have many opportunities to apply these concepts to ill-defined, complex, open-ended problems like the ones practicing engineers solve. With open-ended problems, the core engineering work is not finding the answer, but rather deciding how to mathematically represent (i.e. “model”) the system so that it can be analyzed. These modeling skills of engineers are called “engineering judgment.” Students need opportunities to learn and practice engineering judgment throughout their entire education, starting in their engineering science courses when they first learn these foundational concepts. This project features two integrated goals—to develop a new type of assignment and to conduct learning science research in context—that will advance knowledge around students’ professional formation as engineers. The new assignment being developed, called Open-Ended Modeling Problems, gives students a chance to practice engineering judgment by asking them to model a complex, real-world system. Intertwined with this assignment development is the in-depth study of how students exhibit engineering judgment in ways that are similar to that of practicing engineers—just at an undergraduate level. This research will inform the structure and implementation of the Open-Ended Modeling Problems and will produce generalizable knowledge about how students solve open-ended problems. This project will be conducted by a research team consisting of engineering education researchers and engineering faculty who will collaborate to develop, implement, and study Open-Ended Modeling Problems.Engineers solving problems in the workplace use mathematical models to analyze physical phenomena in the real world and to design solutions to problems. When constructing mathematical models, engineers use judgment to make assumptions, simplify real world characteristics, and assess the reasonableness of a model’s output. While engineering judgment is essential for engineering practice, engineering students rarely practice or engage in judgment while in school. Students are not usually given the opportunity to solve ill-defined problems that necessitate and cultivate the use of judgment until their capstone design course. This project seeks to investigate how novice engineers—students—make modeling judgments when given the opportunity to solve ill-defined dynamics and thermodynamics problems. It uses a design-based research methodology to produce foundational engineering education research knowledge and evidence-based pedagogical reforms. This project will use a constructivist grounded theory approach to identify students’ emergent judgment skills and to characterize the productive beginnings of engineering judgment (RQ1: In what ways do undergraduate engineering students display the productive beginnings of engineering judgment?). The research project's findings will contribute towards training engineering students to solve more complex problems and better prepare them for solving problems in engineering practice. The project will also investigate how to create scaffolding guidelines to help faculty develop problems that give opportunities for students to practice making judgments (RQ2: What assignment scaffolding supports students’ development of the productive beginnings of engineering judgment?) and help them recognize judgments in students’ thinking and work (RQ3: What assignment scaffolding makes students’ productive beginnings of engineering judgment visible to instructors?). The research team will use interviews, group discussions, student work, and surveys to triangulate the findings. The study will produce a framework of the productive beginnings of engineering judgment; research-to-practice guidelines for writing, assigning, facilitating, and grading open-ended modeling problems; and samples of student work and student discourse that exemplify the productive beginnings of engineering judgment.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.