2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

This paper addresses some of the difficulties we see in many engineering classes. A majority of engineering classes are still taught using the conventional lecturing system whereby the professor talks in front of an audience, be it in person, online, pre-recorded, or a hybrid system. In today’s information technology age, students naturally turn to online lectures and YouTube videos for topic-specific notes or practice to get ready for the exams. Many of the in-coming college or university students spent their high school years in social isolation or lock-down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The concept of teams and collaborations has not been the main mode of their learning and engagement in classes. This situation can have an adverse effect on their development when they join an institution of higher learning. There is considerable research conducted on the advantages of integrating elements of teamwork, collaboration, and experimentation with the team for in-class activities. This approach is shown to be especially effective for some of the early classes. In this work, we would like to focus on our experience in using in-class engagement and collaborating activities as the main mode of our classes in Introduction to Electrical Engineering and the undergraduate-level Electromagnetism. This process is a modified version of existing active learning practices. The main idea is to engage students with continued in-class activities and team-based work that encourages students to examine and learn together. Students will work together to tackle problems that would emphasize the basic and the main ideas, methods, and thought process that we would like the students to engage with and develop conceptual comfort and mastery over time.

The paper will introduce the idea and process that we have reported in earlier papers after working with undergraduate students over the years. Next, we will introduce and discuss the two classes (Freshman Engineering and Electromagnetism) where we deployed the method. We will also highlight the students’ work and introduce their journeys by sharing their reflections and some examples of their activities and challenges. The main question that we are trying to ask and find evidence for is, "Can we re-engineer mistakes and use them as an important part of the learning, changing, and adapting to the process, examinations, and growth of the students?” We found that providing low-stakes learning opportunities is impactful in encouraging collaborations among the students and allowing them to openly engage in their own identity, discuss, examine their knowledge and not be afraid of mistakes. In addition, students are more willing to learn from their mistakes, which we argue is the more meaningful approach to achieving effective learning because they are experiencing a better path and interactions for facilitating their experience that would result in remembering the learning and the process.