Engineering Lab Course Research Articles

HANDS-ON EDUCATION WITHOUT THE HANDS-ON? AN APPROACH TO ONLINE DELIVERY OF A SENIOR LAB COURSE IN CHEMICAL ENGINEERING WHILE MAINTAINING KEY LEARNING OUTCOMES

The senior chemical engineering lab course at UBC follows an open-ended problem-based lab (PBL) framework, which has been shown in previous work to improve self-reported learning outcomes in students. Given the hands-on experiential components of lab-based courses in general, their shift to remote delivery, such as the one required by the COVID-19 pandemic, is challenging. Shifting a PBL course to a virtual setting while maintaining its more open-ended learning outcomes is likely even more difficult. This paper outlines the design of an online senior PBL course in chemical and biological engineering, in which TAs, present in the lab, act as Operators and implement student-designed experimental plans over several weeks, while maintaining active virtual contact with their teams. Feedback from students on this experience, the particulars of the course design, and the perceived value of this approach, based on data collected from survey responses, is presented and compared to similar data collected for the latest in-person offering of the same course.

Development and Implementation of a Virtual Cell Culture Lab Practical for an Introductory BME Lab Course.

The transition to remote learning in response to the COVID-19 pandemic necessitated the adaptation of an in-person cell culture lab practical to a virtual assessment in an introductory biomedical engineering lab course. The virtual lab practical was administered in the course LMS and implemented video, data analysis, and multiple-choice questions. Average student scores and grade distributions were comparable across in-person and virtual lab practical formats. Instructors observed fewer grading concerns for the virtual practical compared to previous in-person offerings. The virtual lab practical may be preferred over in-person lab practical in future offerings due to decreased student stress, lower cost, reduced required instructor time, and limited availability of equipment. Resources developed for the virtual practical, including video tutorials and a hemocytometer simulator to practice calculations, can be used by other educators and as supplements to existing course material.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1007/s43683-020-00016-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Technical writing improvements through engineering lab courses

Improving assessment of engineering students’ technical communication skills is a good way to monitor and improve teaching of these skills, and positively impact associated learning. The present study reports on a method used to assess students’ technical writing abilities, while also evaluating the impact of technical writing-related instruction and associated curricular and pedagogical approaches. In this way, students’ improvements can be mapped to instruction methods. The strategies for enhancing the delivery of technical writing-related instruction are discussed in terms of the proposed assessment method. This method has three main parts: 1) Sample Generation Procedure – the strategic establishment of a pair of written reports, serving as BEFORE-Labs and AFTER-Labs, and similar enough in topic to justify comparison after assessment, but unexpected to students so that reports are not simply replicated; 2) A Rubric for Technical Writing – encompassing major features of technical writing requirements of engineering lab courses and developed to be both descriptive (having descriptions in each category, to make expectations explicit for evaluators and students) and holistic (having short summarizing narratives for different levels of work, to capture overall quality quickly); and 3) an Evaluation Demonstration – in which a matrix of faculty instructors from sections of different engineering lab courses used the rubric to retroactively assess the samples. Together, these efforts are used not only to assess improvements in students’ technical writing, but by effect also gauge teaching and effectiveness of curricular and pedagogical interventions. In two engineering lab courses, a thermo-fluid lab course and a solid mechanics lab course, BEFORE-Labs and AFTER-Labs were generated using either a method of impromptu “one-hour labs”, with experiments conducted and reports submitted all within an hour at the beginning and end of one semester, or comparison of full lab reports from consecutive semesters of students. Evaluation results clearly show that there were aggregate improvements in students’ technical writing skills, and as such it is concluded that the teaching methods were effective.

Using a Transfer-Focused Writing Pedagogy to Improve Undergraduates’ Lab Report Writing in Gateway Engineering Laboratory Courses

Background: The lab report is a commonly assigned genre in engineering lab courses; however, students often have difficulties meeting the expectations of writing in engineering labs. At the same time, it is challenging for engineering faculty to instruct lab report writing because they are often under-supported in writing pedagogies and usually unfamiliar with the extent of students' prior writing knowledge. Literature review: Literature on technical communication in engineering addresses the importance of a rhetorical approach to writing instruction, as well as an emphasis on genre. Extending this literature, research into writing transfer provides valuable insight for better understanding how undergraduates negotiate the engineering lab report as a new genre within this distinct rhetorical context. Research questions: 1. How effective is a transfer-focused writing pedagogy in supporting students' understanding of the genre conventions of engineering lab reports? 2. How does the transfer-focused writing pedagogy impact students' writing quality in five categories (rhetorical knowledge, organization, evidence, critical thinking, and disciplinary conventions)? 3. What are the rhetorical features that engineering students improve or struggle with the most with lab report writing? Research methodology: Four engineering instructors and two English instructors participated in this study to design and develop the lab report writing instructional module, and implemented the module materials into their engineering lab courses. The module, consisting of lab report writing instruction and assessment resources, shares a rhetorical approach and foundational writing terms with first-year composition courses to emphasize a writing-transfer pedagogy. We collected and analyzed undergraduates' lab report samples to evaluate the impact of the module on students' writing performance. Two sets of lab reports were collected for analysis: the sample sets before (control), during the 2015-2016 academic year; and after (experimental) implementation of the module, during the 2016-2017 academic year. Results and conclusions: Data collected via pre- and post-implementation writing artifacts show that a rhetorical approach to teaching lab reports helped students better understand the expectations of the lab report as a discipline-specific genre, and it developed students' understanding of the rhetorical features of engineering writing. The pilot module positively impacted the quality of students' lab reports, a finding that suggests that using a transfer-focused writing pedagogy can successfully support the transfer and adaptation of writing knowledge into gateway or entry-level engineering laboratory courses.

Implementation and use of cloud-based electronic lab notebook in a bioprocess engineering teaching laboratory

BackgroundElectronic lab notebooks (ELNs) are better equipped than paper lab notebooks (PLNs) to handle present-day life science and engineering experiments that generate large data sets and require high levels of data integrity. But limited training and a lack of workforce with ELN knowledge have restricted the use of ELN in academic and industry research laboratories which still rely on cumbersome PLNs for recordkeeping. We used LabArchives, a cloud-based ELN in our bioprocess engineering lab course to train students in electronic record keeping, good documentation practices (GDPs), and data integrity.ResultsImplementation of ELN in the bioprocess engineering lab course, an analysis of user experiences, and our development actions to improve ELN training are presented here. ELN improved pedagogy and learning outcomes of the lab course through stream lined workflow, quick data recording and archiving, and enhanced data sharing and collaboration. It also enabled superior data integrity, simplified information exchange, and allowed real-time and remote monitoring of experiments. Several attributes related to positive user experiences of ELN improved between the two subsequent years in which ELN was offered. Student responses also indicate that ELN is better than PLN for compliance.ConclusionsWe demonstrated that ELN can be successfully implemented in a lab course with significant benefits to pedagogy, GDP training, and data integrity. The methods and processes presented here for ELN implementation can be adapted to many types of laboratory experiments.

An Experience of Educational Innovation for the Collaborative Learning in Software Engineering

This paper describes the experience in collaborative learning based educational innovation for the Software Engineering Subject at the Telecommunications Engineering School of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. We describe the context of evolution of the Software Engineering related subjects in the Masterâ??s degree in Telecommunications Engineering (specialization in Telematics) for their adaptation to the educational and organizational postulates of the European Space for Higher Education. In this context, we describe a pilot project for the adaptation of the Software Engineering Lab course, which includes the development and validation of a software engineering tool environment and a web platform for collaborative work.

Teaching Sustainability Analysis in Electrical Engineering Lab Courses

Laboratory courses represent an incompletely tapped opportunity to teach sustainability concepts. This work introduces and evaluates a simple strategy used to teach sustainability concepts in electrical engineering laboratory courses. The technique would readily adapt to other disciplines. The paper presents assessment data and a wiki containing student sustainability analyses.

A virtual electric machine laboratory for synchronous machine application

AbstractEngineering education can reach the desired level if practical laboratory works are given together with the theory. In electrical engineering education, if foundation costs are considered the electrical machine labs become very important. Due to the increasing number of students accessing the university educational structures, the cost of laboratories for didactical electric machine applications is going to be very high. In this study, virtual laboratory, which is found to have wide application field in recent years, is introduced. For this purpose, a virtual electrical machine lab for electrical engineering lab courses is developed. An example of application was presented for the control of synchronous motor and no‐load and blocked rotor test of synchronous generator. Moreover, this study explores the learning effect related to different learning styles of web‐based virtual lab that has developed in electric engineering students. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput Appl Eng Educ 17: 187–195, 2009; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com); DOI 10.1002/cae20133

エンジンを教材とした教育の一方法

It seems to be difficult to use engines as educational materials in mechanical engineering lab courses because of lack of budget, space, time and instructors. In this paper, some ideas of using engines with small amount of budget, without changing timetables, with small space and only with one instructor are introduced. We have been working on the program for four years, and obtained good educational results. Three items are used to evaluate students' performances; checking preparative works with short exams, checking behaviors on the day of lab courses and checking assignments posted after the lab courses. It is suggested that preparative works are the most important to obtain higher educational results.

Mechanical engineering lab courses using virtual instrument computer software

Computer-based virtual instrument (VI) software is used on six experiments in two upper-level mechanical engineering laboratory courses at Rice University. The students interface with the experiment through VIs on a computer screen running under LabVIEW® software. The software performs data acquisition, data storage, and graphic presentation, and in some cases, it controls system parameters. In one case, the experiment can even be run automatically. In almost all cases, the LabVIEW programs were developed as student projects, and in most cases, the experimental setups were done by the students, which provided them with very educational senior-design projects. Using these computer-based systems provides accurate data acquisition, reduced time to complete the lab, more opportunity for student observation, and time for lecture and discussion of the basic principles involved. The students relate well to these VI-run labs, and these VI systems have proved a reliable, beneficial teaching aid for the mechanical engineering department. © 1998 National Instruments. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Lab Robotics and Automation 10: 83–87, 1998

Mechanical engineering lab courses using virtual instrument computer software

Computer-based virtual instrument (VI) software is used on six experiments in two upper-level mechanical engineering laboratory courses at Rice University. The students interface with the experiment through VIs on a computer screen running under LabVIEW® software. The software performs data acquisition, data storage, and graphic presentation, and in some cases, it controls system parameters. In one case, the experiment can even be run automatically. In almost all cases, the LabVIEW programs were developed as student projects, and in most cases, the experimental setups were done by the students, which provided them with very educational senior-design projects. Using these computer-based systems provides accurate data acquisition, reduced time to complete the lab, more opportunity for student observation, and time for lecture and discussion of the basic principles involved. The students relate well to these VI-run labs, and these VI systems have proved a reliable, beneficial teaching aid for the mechanical engineering department. © 1998 National Instruments. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Lab Robotics and Automation 10: 83–87, 1998