Of green monkeys and failed affordances: A case study of a mechanical engineering design course

Abstract

This article reports on an ethnographic study of a mechanical engineering design class. The findings are based on participant observation of one student design team of three students as they designed, tested and built an engineered solution to a problem over a period of ten weeks. The paper describes the curricular efforts to provide social and material affordances both for learning and doing design, and the failure of students on the observed team to take up those affordances. It offers explanations for failure within a framework of conflicting classroom views and pedagogic issues. It discusses the implications of the observed student behavior for design education in general, and mechanical engineering design, in particular.