Variations in students’ conceptions of good teaching in engineering education: a phenomenographic investigation

Abstract

ABSTRACT The growing need for good teaching practices in Engineering Education (Eng.Ed) that will improve the graduate's complex engineering problem-solving skills, has attracted a great deal of attention from researchers in recent years. This increasing interest demands that practitioners should examine their teaching practices from all corners, particularly from students’ lenses. This study aims to investigate the conceptions of good teaching as conceived by students from the engineering discipline by using a phenomenographic approach. A cohort of 15 students from five engineering universities of Bangladesh was interviewed to explore their different ways of understanding and experiencing good teaching. From the phenomenographic analysis, five categories of good teaching were revealed: managing the classroom effectively; simplifying the concept; ensuring communication between teacher and student; engaging students; and practicing in the real world. The five dimensions of variation were identified and a hierarchical relationship among the categories was constructed. The findings play a significant role in the clear understanding of good teaching practices in Eng.Ed from a new perspective. The findings also provide insights necessary for the development of a more robust engineering curriculum that takes into consideration a conducive learning environment (classroom management), logical arrangement of curricula content, engaging activities, and industrial attachments.