2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Engineers often employ freehand sketching to generate design concepts and effectively communicate ideas to their peers. Another benefit of freehand sketching is that it has been shown to improve spatial visualization skills and subsequently improve graduation rates in engineering disciplines. This paper analyzes the impact of sketch training by gender. A controlled trial was conducted within a freshman-level mechanical design course where students learned CAD and constructed robots. In the Control Section, comprising 82 students, participants were assigned 6 freehand sketching assignments on paper. In contrast, the intervention group, consisting of 70 students, completed 146 sketching assignments using software that provided automatic grading of sketches. Pre- and post-course assessments of spatial visualization ability were conducted using the PSVT:R standardized test. Students also completed Pre and Post surveys to rate their skills in a range of areas including, CAD, use of shop tools, communicating design ideas to teammates, and applying engineering theory to the project. The Intervention sections showed increased PSVT:R scores over the Control section for the all students in the section with p= 0.0019, and higher benefits for students who enter with low and mid level Pre-PSVT:R scores. There were significantly higher gains in PSVT:R for female students who entered with Low Pre-PSVT:R scores with an increase in 16% compared to 4% in the Control section, p = 0.0073. The survey also showed statistically significant improvement in CAD ability among male students (p= 0.043) and female students (p= 0.013). In this study the higher amount of freehand sketch training correlated with benefits for all engineering students, but especially for female engineering students and helped close the gap in a number of areas between genders that was apparent at the beginning of the course.