Tangling With Spaghetti: Pedagogical Lessons From Games

Abstract

Governments are seeking to develop entrepreneurial competencies among today’s technology, science, and engineering graduates. However, the creation of “bilingual” graduates who have dual technical and managerial competencies is thwarted by students’ inferior teamwork and interpersonal skills. In education, what is taught is inextricably bound to how it is taught (Dewey, 1916). Current pedagogies in engineering education are insufficiently adapted to student learning style needs (Felder & Silverman, 1988), and the management component of engineering education remains underdeveloped. This problem is keenly felt in one French engineering school where students struggle with a team-based innovation project. We detail efforts made to equip students with teamwork skills by using games as a pedagogical device. Student teams compete to build weight resistant structures using only spaghetti sticks and sewing thread. Their written feedback forms the primary qualitative data for this study. Individual student interviews were subsequently carried out to further uncover potential learning outcomes. We found that students’ responses to the spaghetti game were overwhelmingly positive. Their commentary also illustrates concrete learning of many crucial teamwork processes. Finally, we discuss what makes this pedagogical innovation work and how it should be further studied.