From Gatekeeping to Engagement: A Multicontextual, Mixed Method Study of Student Academic Engagement in Introductory STEM Courses.

The lack of academic engagement in introductory science courses is considered by some to be a primary reason why students switch out of science majors. This study employed a sequential, explanatory mixed methods approach to provide a richer understanding of the relationship between student engagement and introductory science instruction. Quantitative survey data were drawn from 2,873 students within 73 introductory science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses across 15 colleges and universities, and qualitative data were collected from 41 student focus groups at eight of these institutions. The findings indicate that students tended to be more engaged in courses where the instructor consistently signaled an openness to student questions and recognizes her/his role in helping students succeed. Likewise, students who reported feeling comfortable asking questions in class, seeking out tutoring, attending supplemental instruction sessions, and collaborating with other students in the course were also more likely to be engaged. Instructional implications for improving students' levels of academic engagement are discussed

Contemporary developments in teaching and learning introductory programming: Towards a research proposal

The teaching and learning of introductory programming in tertiary institutions is problematic. Failure rates are high and the inability of students to complete small programming tasks at the completion of introductory units is not unusual. The literature on teaching programming contains many examples of changes in teaching strategies and curricula that have been implemented in an effort to reduce failure rates. This paper analyses contemporary research into the area, and summarises developments in the teaching of introductory programming. It also focuses on areas for future research which will potentially lead to improvements in both the teaching and learning of introductory programming. A graphical representation of the issues from the literature that are covered in the document is provided in the introduction

Sustainable development as a threshold concept : an investigation into chemical engineering students' knowledge

Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 82-86).These studies aimed to investigate the sustainability conceptions held by engineering students and to assess their level of knowledge on sustainability concepts. The findings revealed that the level of knowledge is poor and engineering students had varying ideas on what sustainability is

Framework para la construcción de estrategias didácticas para la enseñanza inicial de la programación de computadoras

El proyecto que se describe tiene por objetivo principal la definición de un framework de herramientas didácticas que facilite la construcción de estrategias de enseñanza para los cursos introductorios de programación. Entendemos por herramientas didácticas a todo concepto, técnica, instrumento o procedimiento que permita hacer efectiva la enseñanza. Por estrategia de enseñanza, a la planificación específica, que hace el docente, del procedimiento a seguir y herramientas a utilizar para lograr los objetivos pedagógicos. El framework en cuestión estará compuesto por herramientas didácticas, tanto conceptuales como tecnológicas, un conjunto de requerimientos para el diseño de nuevas herramientas y ejemplos de su aplicación para el diseño de estrategias de enseñanza de contenidos y desarrollo de competencias específicos. De entrevistas a docentes, se obtendrán descripciones de estrategias y métodos que serán categorizados y organizados en estilos de enseñanza, así como recursos conceptuales y tecnológicos utilizados en la práctica de la enseñanza; se elicitarán requerimientos para el diseño de nuevas herramienta. Los resultados permitirán construir un modelo conceptual sobre el que se fundará el diseño del framework. Se construirá un prototipo que permita validar los resultados de este proyecto.Eje: Innovación en Educación en Informática.Red de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

The phenomenographic method in educational research

La fenomenografía es un enfoque metodológico nacido hace pocas décadas de la investigación educativa que ha sido poco utilizado en la investigación sobre tecnología educativa. La fenomenografía, en esencia, analiza las variaciones en las concepciones que tienen las personas relativas a un fenómeno del mundo que les rodea, su foco no está en comprender las diferentes concepciones que tienen los distintos individuos y que ayuden a entender las distintas formas de concebir un determinado fenómeno. En este artículo pretendemos hacer una descripción de qué es y cómo se usa la fenomenografía en la investigación educativa con la finalidad última de fomentar el desarrollo de una mayor y mejor investigación educativa. Así, tras hacer una revisión sobre el concepto de fenomenografía y de las concepciones como principal objeto de estudio en este método, se analiza uno de los aspectos más relevantes del enfoque fenomenográfico que es la selección de los participantes y sus diferencias con respecto a otras investigaciones cualitativas, las características definitorias de la entrevista fenomenográfica que la su principal técnica de recogida de información de las investigaciones fenomenográficas y las particularidades del proceso de análisis de los datos. Además, se analizan algunos ejemplos del uso de la fenomenografía en la investigación sobre tecnología educativa identificando las principales características que comparten y se concluye presentando los principales aportes del método y ventajas de su utilizaciónPhenomenography is a methodological approach born a few decades ago in educational research that has been little used in educational technology research. Phenomenography, in essence, analyses the variations in the conceptions that people have about a phenomenon in the world around them, its focus is not on understanding the different conceptions that different individuals have and that help to understand the different ways of conceiving a given phenomenon. In this article we aim to describe what phenomenography is and how it is used in educational research with the ultimate goal of encouraging the development of more and better educational research. Thus, after reviewing the concept of phenomenography and conceptions as the main object of study in this method, we analyze one of the most relevant aspects of the phenomenographic approach, which is the selection of participants and its differences with respect to other qualitative research, the defining characteristics of the phenomenographic interview, which is the main technique for collecting information in phenomenographic research, and the particularities of the data analysis process. In addition, some examples of the use of phenomenography in educational technology research are analyzed, identifying the main characteristics they share and concluding by presenting the main contributions of the method and the advantages of its us

Undergraduate engineering students\u27 experiences of interdisciplinary learning: a phenomenographic perspective

Engineers are expected to work with people with different disciplinary knowledge to solve real-world problems that are inherently complex, which is one of the reasons that interdisciplinary learning has become a common pedagogical practice in engineering education. However, empirical evidence on the impact of interdisciplinary learning on undergraduates is lacking. Regardless of the differences in the scope of methods used to assess interdisciplinary learning, frameworks of interdisciplinary learning are imperative for developing attainable outcomes as well as interpreting assessment data. Existing models of interdisciplinary learning have been either conceptual or based on research faculty members\u27 experiences rather than empirical data. The study addressed the gap by exploring the different ways that undergraduate engineering students experience interdisciplinary learning. A phenomenographic methodological framework was used to guide the design, data collection, and data analysis of the study. Twenty-two undergraduate engineering students with various interdisciplinary learning experiences were interviewed using semi-structured protocols. They concretely described their experiences and reflected meaning associated with those experiences. Analysis of the data revealed eight qualitatively different ways that students experience interdisciplinary learning, which include: interdisciplinary learning as (A) no awareness of differences, (B) control and assertion, (C) coping with differences, (D) navigating creative differences, (E) learning from differences, (F) bridging differences, (G) expanding intellectual boundaries, and (H) commitment to holistic perspectives. Categories D through H represent a hierarchical structure of increasingly comprehensive way of experiencing interdisciplinary learning. Further analysis uncovered two themes that varied throughout the categories: (i) engagement with differences and (ii) purpose and integration. Students whose experiences lie outside of the hierarchical structure need to engage difference in a positive manner and also have a purpose in engaging differences in order to experience interdisciplinary learning in a more comprehensive way. The results offer insights into the design of curriculum and classroom interdisciplinary experiences in engineering education