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

大部分的本科工程专业学生采取的课程是“工程科学”课程，目前的基础工程概念和公式。然而，在这些课程中，学生通常完成定义明确的“教科书”问题，只有一个正确答案。他们没有太多的机会将这些概念应用于定义不清、复杂、开放式的问题，就像执业工程师解决的问题一样。对于开放式问题，核心工程工作不是找到答案，而是决定如何数学表示（即“建模”）系统，以便可以分析。工程师的这些建模技能被称为“工程判断”。学生需要在整个教育过程中学习和实践工程判断的机会，从他们第一次学习这些基础概念时开始学习工程科学课程。该项目具有两个综合目标-开发一种新型的任务，并在上下文中进行学习科学研究-这将促进学生作为工程师的专业形成的知识。正在开发的新作业，称为开放式建模问题，让学生有机会通过要求他们模拟一个复杂的现实世界的系统来实践工程判断。与此任务的发展是学生如何表现出工程判断的方式，类似于实践的工程师，只是在本科阶段的深入研究。本研究将告知开放式建模问题的结构和实施，并将产生关于学生如何解决开放式问题的可推广的知识。本项目由工程教育研究人员和工程系教师组成的研究小组共同开发、实施和研究开放式建模问题。工程师在工作场所解决问题时，使用数学模型分析真实的世界中的物理现象，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，简化真实的世界特征，并评估模型输出的合理性。虽然工程判断是必不可少的工程实践，工程专业的学生很少实践或从事判断，而在学校。学生通常没有机会解决不明确的问题，需要和培养判断的使用，直到他们的顶点设计课程。这个项目旨在研究新手工程师学生如何建模判断时，有机会解决不明确的动力学和热力学问题。它使用基于设计的研究方法来产生基础工程教育研究知识和基于证据的教学改革。这个项目将使用建构主义扎根理论的方法来确定学生的紧急判断技能，并描述工程判断的生产性开端（RQ 1：本科工程专业学生以何种方式展示工程判断的生产性开端？）。该研究项目的结果将有助于培养工程学生解决更复杂的问题，并为他们解决工程实践中的问题做好更好的准备。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，让学生有机会练习做出判断（RQ 2：什么任务脚手架支持学生的工程判断的生产性开始的发展？）并帮助他们认识到学生的思维和工作中的判断（RQ 3：什么样的任务脚手架使学生的工程判断的富有成效的开始可见的教师？）。研究小组将使用访谈，小组讨论，学生工作，和调查，以三角调查结果。这项研究将产生一个框架的生产开始的工程判断，研究实践的指导方针，写作，分配，促进和分级开放式建模问题;以及学生工作和学生话语的样本，这些样本体现了工程判断的富有成效的开端。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准。

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.