2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Novel Engineering (NE) is an interdisciplinary approach to teach engineering and literacy in elementary and middle schools. Students use classroom literature (stories, novels, and expository texts) to identify engineering problems and explore their ideas through design projects to solve these problems. This innovative approach was developed by the Center for Engineering Education and Outreach (CEEO) at Tufts University.
In order to further improve the NE program and increase its adoption, we wanted to understand teachers’ experiences with NE and the barriers they face in the implementation of NE activities. The aims of this study were to identify the top barriers to NE implementation and uncover if any relationship exists between teachers’ backgrounds and the barriers they mentioned.
This study employed a mixed methods approach, combining quantitative and qualitative research methods. Data for this study were collected through one-on-one interviews and an online questionnaire conducted with 12 elementary school teachers. Based on the previous research, we identified 10 potential barriers to NE implementation. Through the quantitative questionnaire, we wanted to unearth the top barriers from this list of 10 potential barriers. Instead of asking teachers to simply rank these factors, a risk assessment methodology was utilized to explore each of the factors in detail and understand their specific impact on teachers. Questions for the semi-structured style interview were designed to understand teachers’ experiences with hands-on activities, the process of planning NE, how NE looked in their classrooms, major challenges they faced when planning and implementing NE, strategies they employed to overcome the challenges they had, suggestions they had for other teachers, and whether or not they saw value in NE approach.
Results of the quantitative and qualitative responses indicate lack of time, pressure from the administration to meet standards, and access to materials as top barriers to NE implementation. Formal professional development training was found to have a significant positive influence on teachers’ NE experiences. Another influencing element was more years of teaching experience. Teachers are more likely to implement NE if they either received professional development training or have more than 10 years of teaching experience.
Despite various challenges identified by the elementary school teachers, all of them strongly acknowledged the value programs like NE bring into classrooms and their intent to include the NE approach in the future.