Abstract
Transferable skills are gaining an increasing emphasis in engineering education. The skills of teamwork, communication, self directed learning and problem solving feature in most of the accrediting agencies criteria. This paper is a case study of a course which uses Problem Based Learning method to deliver key transferable skills to engineering students studying via distance education The students use a range of communication systems including a Learning Management System which offers synchronous and asynchronous communications to work in a team where there is no face to face contact between either the team members or with the supervising academic. The teams solve open ended, contextualised engineering problems. These teams form a learning community which scaffolds individual and team learning goals. Results from a longitudinal study show that students significantly increase their teamwork, communication, problem solving and self directed learning skills. These are key graduate attributes now required by professional accreditation bodies. In addition specific theoretical and technical skills and knowledge are learnt and applied to new problems.
Highlights
The University of Southern Queensland (USQ) is a small Australian regional university
The investigation focused on establishing whether the key graduate attributes of problem solving, teamwork, communication skills and lifelong and self directed learning could be successfully delivered using problem based learning with students working in virtual teams
This paper investigates the continuous development and evaluation of the first problem-based learning (PBL) course, ENG1101 Engineering Problem Solving 1
Summary
The University of Southern Queensland (USQ) is a small Australian regional university. Whilst the Australian average for enrolments other than full time on campus is approximately 27% [2], USQ has approximately 80% of students studying via distance education [3]. It is demonstrated in this paper that team based Problem Based Learning (PBL), where peer mentoring and assistance is encouraged and rewarded, is one solution This allows the course pedagogy to work with, and use to advantage, prior knowledge of the student cohort
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