Industry Oriented Teaching and Learning strategies applied to the course within traditional engineering technology undergraduate program

Abstract

With traditional technical teaching methodologies in educational environments, the conventional pathway is to build the foundation learning through subject based teaching of maths, physics and science independently. Subjects based on the relative topics required for the discipline usually follow on from this. The problem with this traditional methodology of learning is that there is no close relationship with industry requirements. Students may well graduate with no industrial oriented learning experience prior to their first job. Previous researches by author and his colleague were to explore a new teaching methodology - an industry oriented the teaching and learning in an undergraduate degree in New Zealand. All foundation skills can be achieved within technical courses studies and the students are well prepared to develop further knowledge and skills required for their industry project required in their final year through cooperative education with industry. This paper is to introduce the industry oriented teaching and learning methodology into a traditional engineering technology undergraduate degree. As an example, a course with this new methodology had been designed and delivered in a joint program within Shanghai Normal University (China) and Dayton University (USA) since 2006.