DIDACTIC MATERIALS SUPPORTING CAD/CAE SYSTEM TEACHING

Abstract

In the period of rapid technological advancement and formation of the fourth industrial revolution, the role of educational institutions is to respond to these phenomena, both by creating adequate curricula design and by ensuring necessary material and technical equipment needed for learner professional training. Unfortunately, in Slovakia the founders of schools do not respond adequately to this trend and therefore teachers must often take over the task to implement innovative elements reflecting social development and the needs of practice into the learning and teaching processes themselves. A main pioneer in innovation and technical novelties is industry. Industry is a dominant creator of each country image and has an impact on the future of students, who are its potential employees. Teachers have many surveys available offered by reputable agencies that reflect current enterprices needs. Based on the results of these surveys, the teachers can tailor their educational curricula to the subjects they teach. In this context, secondary vocational schools – which prepare students for their future profession - have an outstanding role in forming students` technical thinking. Slovakia, in terms of the structure of its economy, is one of the significant car and components manufacturers for the automotive industry. Therefore, preparation of qualified labourers for this area of the economy is currently one of the priority tasks of secondary vocational schools in Slovakia. The paper is focused on issues of implementation of alternative CAD / CAE teaching practices which are broadly used just in the automotive industry. From the authors` point of view, traditional way of teaching has been no longer adequate to the current requirements of practice on the competency profile of secondary technical school graduates. Through an example of teaching the subject Technical Graphics (taught in the second grade of secondary vocational school, in the study branch Electrical Engineering and Technical Lyceum), the authors analyse strengths and weaknesses of the alternative methods proposed by them. This they do in comparison with the traditional method of teaching, which is focused on creating technical drawings. At this way of creating 2D technical drawings, students` creativity is not developed. At the alternative way of teaching, emphasis is placed on 3D modelling, which also results in a technical drawing, but there is created also a 3D component. In the paper presented research is focused on pilot verification of the methodology and tools of the proposed alternative teaching of CAD / CAE systems in practice.