scholarly journals A Rubric to Assess and Improve Technical Writing in Undergraduate Engineering Courses

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 146
Author(s):  
Maria Asun Cantera ◽  
María-José Arevalo ◽  
Vanessa García-Marina ◽  
Marian Alves-Castro
Keyword(s):  
Diagnostic Tool ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Technical Writing ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
Future Application ◽  
Main Interest ◽  
Technical Aspects ◽  
Undergraduate Engineering ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
And Mathematics

Although there is consensus in the literature that writing skills are important in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) studies, they are often neglected. However, some efforts have been made to correct this deficiency, one of them being the development of assessment rubrics. This study seeks to contribute to the discussion by presenting the results of the application of a rubric designed to assess the writing skills of a group of 3rd year engineering students. This rubric, which includes linguistic and rhetorical-organizational criteria alongside the mathematical and technical, was used to assess a number of written exercises and essays submitted by students in a 15-week course. The main interest of this study was to test the efficacy of the rubric as a diagnostic tool, conceived to detect the areas of improvement in the students’ written performance and, ultimately, to also help them to achieve higher levels of competence. This goal was achieved, as one of the main conclusions of the study is that, although students usually master the technical aspects of the course, they must improve the linguistic and rhetorical aspects of their written communication. It can likewise be said that all the participants involved in the study profited in one way or another from the application of the rubric and contributed to identifying the ways in which the rubric itself can be improved for future application.

scholarly journals Analysis of University STEM Students’ Mathematical, Linguistic, Rhetorical–Organizational Assignment Errors

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 173
Author(s):  
María-José Arévalo ◽  
María Asun Cantera ◽  
Vanessa García-Marina ◽  
Marian Alves-Castro
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
Mathematics Students ◽  
Educational Design ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
Communicative Strategies ◽  
Precise Diagnosis ◽  
Stem Students ◽  
And Mathematics

Although Error Analysis (EA) has been broadly used in Foreign Language and Mother Tongue learning contexts, it has not been applied in the field of engineering and by STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) students in a systematic way. In this interdisciplinary pilot study, we applied the EA methodology to a wide corpus of exercises and essays written by third-year students of mechanical engineering, with the main purpose of achieving a precise diagnosis of the students’ strengths and weaknesses in writing skills. For the analysis to be as exhaustive as possible, the errors were typologized into three main categories (linguistic, mathematical, and rhetorical–organizational), each of which is, in turn, subdivided into 15 items. The results show that the predominant errors are rhetorical–organizational (39%) and linguistic (38%). The application of EA permits the precise identification of the areas of improvement and the subsequent implementation of an educational design that allows STEM students to improve their communicative strategies, especially those related to the writing skills and, more precisely, those having to do with the optimal use of syntax, punctuation, rhetorical structure of the text, and mathematical coherence.

scholarly journals REFLECTING ON WRITTEN COMMUNICATION AS AN EMBEDDED COMPONENT IN UNDERGRADUATE ENGINEERING CURRICULA

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arun S. Moorthy ◽  
Warren H. Stiver
Keyword(s):  
Stem Education ◽  
Technical Writing ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
Written Communication ◽  
Undergraduate Engineering ◽  
High Level ◽  
Time Demands

Communication in general and technicalwriting in particular have long been seen as importanthigher order skills for all graduating and practicingengineers. Developing technical writing skills in ourstudents requires a high level of student-instructorinteraction. The interaction needs to provide meaningful,embedded and iterative writing opportunities. Feedbackthat is detailed and timely is essential for successotherwise numerous writing experiences can reinforcepoor writing behaviors. Providing this intensity ofinteraction can be difficult in a technically focused andpacked curriculum. It can be difficult in competition withother time demands on students and instructors alike. Inthis paper, we present opinions on the challenges,opportunities, and approaches in providing technicalwriting education and support for undergraduateEngineering students. We focus primarily in theframework of Engineering curricula at Universities inOntario, but ideas discussed also have applications tohigher-level STEM education in general.

Technical writing improvements through engineering lab courses

2020 ◽  
pp. 030641902093962
Author(s):  
Kamau Wright ◽  
Paul E Slaboch ◽  
Reihaneh Jamshidi
Keyword(s):  
Teaching Methods ◽  
Technical Communication ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Solid Mechanics ◽  
Technical Writing ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
Assessment Method ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
Generation Procedure

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.

scholarly journals littleBits: Not Just for the Kids

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 124-129
Author(s):  
Andrea Pritt
Keyword(s):  
College Students ◽  
Rapid Prototyping ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Student Interaction ◽  
Academic Setting ◽  
Library Collection ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
Hands On ◽  
Penn State ◽  
And Mathematics

The Penn State Harrisburg Library used grant funds to add two littleBits Workshop Kits to the circulating library collection. The Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Librarian piloted a hands-on activity utilizing littleBits in the college classroom to better support the rapid prototyping skills of engineering students on campus, to promote science literacy to students, and to enhance librarian-student interaction. This article provides an overview of the workshops, which could be duplicated at other institutions, and shares the experiences of three different audiences of college students including challenges, successes, and opportunities for growth and future considerations in utilizing littleBits in an academic setting.

scholarly journals Effective Writing Techniques for Engineering Students

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 1139-1140
Keyword(s):  
Significant Role ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Technical Writing ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
Corporate World ◽  
Engineering Writing

Engineering Writing should be comprehensible, explicit, absolute and relevant. In the Corporate World Technical Writing Skills plays a significant role in the career lives of engineers. They are expected to write memos, brochures, proposals, technical manuscripts, contracts and newsletters. The paper is an attempt to explore various horizons in writing and to remediate writing deficiencies of the engineering students.

scholarly journals An Introduction to 3D Printing in the STEM Classroom

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Evelyn Sander ◽  
Christopher A Manon ◽  
Padmanabhan Seshaiyer
Keyword(s):  
3D Printing ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Science Classroom ◽  
Scientific Models ◽  
Technical Aspects ◽  
Software Packages ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
Hands On ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
Enhance Student Learning

This session is designed to introduce the use of 3D printing in a mathematics or science classroom to those with little or no experience with the technology. It will be a hands-on introduction to design of models using two STEM-focused software packages: Mathematica and OpenSCAD. The audience will come away with a knowledge of the entire progression of 3D printing from an in-class design to the technical aspects of printing. The presentation is based on group-based lab materials created for the calculus classroom (funded by a 4-VA innovation grant). This project demonstrates how inquiry-based approaches can be employed to enhance student learning using a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics).The session will start with a 30-minute lecture, including a demonstration of 3D printing, a review of the types of scientific models available publicly, a discussion of some of the classroom models we have designed, and a summary of the labs given in the calculus classroom. The next hour will consist of a hands on introduction to designing printable scientific models in Mathematica and in OpenSCAD, an open source CAD-based system.

Techniques for Teaching Communication Skills to the Millennial Generation

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Candice Bauer
Keyword(s):  
Communication Skills ◽  
Generation X ◽  
Millennial Generation ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Technical Writing ◽  
Lesson Plan ◽  
Team Building ◽  
Writing Skills ◽  
Lesson Plans ◽  
K 12

Techniques for teaching communication skills to engineering students of the Millennial Generation are reviewed. A detailed outline of the characteristics of the Millennial Generation are described and compared to the traits of other generations. The Millennial Generation has several distinct characteristics such as developing inclusive relationships, tolerating authority, and leading by collaboration. This contrasts with the characteristics of the Baby Boomers and Generation X (the majority of professors and the students’ parents); however, the characteristics align closely with the Traditionalist Generation (higher administration and the students’ grandparents). Strategies for working among the generations are detailed resulting in the creation of an understanding of how to teach to the Millennial Generation. In order to aid the understanding, lesson plans which focus on creating a learner-centered environment are detailed. The lesson plans include objectives, strategies, content, activities, assessment techniques, and ABET alignment. The topics include team building, effective meetings, a term project, writing skills, and speaking skills. Team building illustrates why and how a team achieves its objectives. Example activities include the development of a team charter. The effective meetings lesson plan details techniques on how to teach students project management skills. Criteria for developing term projects to match the Millennial Generation characteristics are detailed, and an example which also includes K-12 outreach activities is presented. The lesson plan for speaking and writing skills defines grading rubrics for the evaluation and assessment of technical writing and presentations. This work has been in development and implemented for nearly five years in a junior level, multidisciplinary course entitled, Engineering Communications, at the University of Nevada, Reno. The lesson plans are evaluated based on course evaluations, industry interviews, case studies, and an alumni survey.

STEM Identities: A Communication Theory of Identity Approach

2021 ◽  
pp. 0261927X2110306
Author(s):  
Craig O. Stewart
Keyword(s):  
Student Persistence ◽  
Communication Theory ◽  
Personal Attributes ◽  
Psychology Research ◽  
Engineering Majors ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Communication Theory Of Identity ◽  
Undergraduate Engineering ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
And Mathematics

Education and psychology research has established STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) identities as an important factor in explaining student persistence in STEM fields. Few studies in social psychology of language or communication have investigated STEM identities, despite the fundamentally communicative nature of identity. Identity talk produced in semi-structured interviews with undergraduate engineering majors ( N = 16) at three U.S. universities was analyzed qualitatively using the Communication Theory of Identity (CTI) as a sensitizing framework. The analysis showed that these students’ STEM identities emphasized personal attributes such as work ethic and a desire to make a positive difference in the world as well as relationships with peers in engineering. A number of potential identity gaps which might present barriers to forming a STEM identity were also evident in the data. These results underscore the importance of a communicative (interactive and relational) perspective in understanding students’ development and expression of STEM identities.

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