Dominik May

PeTEX@Work: Designing CSCL@Work for Online Engineering Education

This chapter reflects on the finalized EU-funded project PeTEX-platform for e-Learning and Telemetric Experimentation aimed at designing and prototyping a CSCL platform-system for developing, implementing, and delivering educational and training programs in the field of manufacturing engineering. The main challenge for the PeTEX project team was to transform actual laboratory test beds, domain specific content and social interaction modes into a web-mediated socio-technical system in order to bring together learning and workplace as CSCL@Work. The designed learning system is based on Moodle and includes distributed tele-operated experimentation facilities, educational content and socio-technical affordances to provide the basis for an international large-scale online learning community. For this purpose the project team developed and established new collaborative learning approaches for students and professionals within the ICT-based system. This chapter gives an overview on the fundamental theoretical principles as well as important steps and results of the participatory design approach applied during the project’s lifetime. It concludes with a set of new tasks and challenges to be considered in future systems.

Experiential remote lab learning with e-portfolios: Integrating tele-operated experiments into environments for reflective learning

The use of laboratories in Higher Engineering Education is an adequate opportunity to implement forms of experiential learning like research-based learning in material sciences. Introducing remote laboratories gives the opportunity to the student to do self-directed research and by that having own and unique learning experiences. Recently finished research projects e.g. like the PeTEX project implemented research-based learning by deploying real laboratory equipment without being physically in the laboratory but having access via the internet. The question in this context is how the student can document his/her own learning processes on the one hand and how the teacher can guide the student through these processes on the other. The proposed solution in this paper is an e-portfolio system on the basis of a personal learning environment. With e-portfolios the student is able to individually and collectively document and reflect what he has been doing and can share his outcomes with others. The paper outlines the important role e-portfolios as personal learning environments can play to experience remote laboratory work and to foster the creative attitude.

Developing Cultural Competency in Engineering Through Transnational Distance Learning

While cultural competency is a stated priority for engineering education in the United States, as emphasized by Outcome H in the ABET standards, it is often difficult to engage students in immersive international experiences that develop intercultural awareness. Undergraduate engineering students face packed curricula with little or no room for languages and an often unforgiving structure that puts them a year out of course sequences if they do travel for study abroad. In this case study, the authors examine how online education can be a transformational factor in this challenge. When designed to create interactive, engaging learning across nations, online education can support joint international experiences that develop cultural competency without requiring the time and expenses that are often a barrier for students. This online model could easily be scaled up to offer more students an international collaboration opportunity without institutional reliance on study abroad. This online transnational distance learning approach saves students and universities time and money, while accomplishing the intended professional competencies.

Teaching and learning globally connected using live online classes for preparing international engineering students for transnational collaboration and for studying in Germany

Students who are leaving their home country for taking part in an international study program face several challenges. Not only the new course of studies can be very challenging but also their whole living conditions may change significantly. This can be a severe clash especially for students who are moving to a country with a totally different cultural background in comparison to their home countries. Moreover it can profoundly complicate the first weeks at the new university. Knowing about the difficulties the Institute of Forming Technology and Lightweight Construction (IUL) at TU Dortmund University in Germany developed a three-weeks preparational online course for those international students coming to the IUL for their Master of Science program in Manufacturing Technology (MMT), a special international master program. In context of this course the use of the IULs remote laboratory equipment was a key aspect. The course itself was implemented and delivered for the first time in 2014. It was designed to prepare the students as best as possible for their new studies at a German university and at the same time prepare them for transnational collaboration. Hence this course is a good example for a meaningful integration of remote laboratories into an innovative curriculum. Without this technology such course concepts with students distributed all over the world would not be possible. Making use if this technology brings the international course participants together and puts them into the situation to interact in context of a typical engineering situation, the experiment. The paper presents the course and experiences from its first implementation.

The Industrial Engineering Laboratory

This paper presents how Problem Based Learning is integrated in Industrial Engineering higher education provided by the Industrial Engineering Laboratory at TU Dortmund University in Germany. After pointing out the necessary asset of competences for Industrial Engineers as the intended learning outcome, Problem Based Learning is presented as one appropriate concept for competence development in higher education in engineering. The implementation of this explicit course design and its advantages is shown by explaining the specific course example “Workplace Design” in detail, which is carried out in a hands-on laboratory - the Industrial Engineering Laboratory.

Using Interactive Online Role-Playing Simulations to Develop Global Competency and to Prepare Engineering Students for a Globalised World.

The world is changing significantly, and it is becoming increasingly globalised. This means that countries, businesses, and professionals must think and act globally to be successful. Many individuals, however, are not prepared with the global competency skills needed to communicate and perform effectively in a globalised system. To address this need, higher education institutions are looking for ways to instil these skills in their students. This paper explains one promising approach using current learning principles: transnational interactive online environments in engineering education. In 2011, the TU Dortmund and the University of Virginia initiated a collaboration in which engineering students from both universities took part in one online synchronous course and worked together on global topics. This paper describes how the course was designed and discusses specific research results regarding how interactive online role-playing simulations support students in gaining the global competency skills required to actively participate in todays international workforce.

Bringing Remote Labs and Mobile Learning together

Within (remote) laboratories in Engineering Education students have the chance to do own experiments and by that gain own experiences in their learning processes. Apart from technical questions, one of the most intriguing aspects in this context is how students can document their learning process and show to others (teachers and/or other students) what they have achieved. Another aspect concerns the question of learner’s mobility during the learning process. If the laboratory can be accessed remotely, why do we constrain learners in their level of liberty by forcing them to sit in front of a fixed computer to use a location-independent environment for experimentation? Therefore, rendering this environment available for mobile devices is the logical consequence. Furthermore, integrating mobile devices into the course’s technical environment means to take a whole new approach to the teaching and learning process itself. It is especially a question of embedding mobile devices into the users’ workflow (or better “learn flow”) rather than a simple question of accessibility. The following article features an example of how remote laboratories can be linked with mobile devices and e-portfolios, thus creating a unique learning environment helping learners to document their personal learning processes and to exchange them with others while at the same time being flexible in means of time and place. This combination of topics has been realized within one subtask of the project “ELLI – Excellent Teaching and Learning in Engineering Education” at TU Dortmund University.

Using Remote Laboratories for Transnational Online Learning Environments in Engineering Education

Working in transnational contexts will be the normal case for the future, especially for engineers. In general this competence can be gained by going abroad during the course of studies. However, not every student can afford going abroad. E-learning technologies can help connect students in different countries and have them work together. Especially for the engineering context, remote laboratories are a very promising technology. With the help of these laboratories, students can perform real live online experiments from their devices at home. Connecting students via the internet and combine this with online experimentation leads to international working groups. The presented course follows such a concept. The online course was developed to prepare students for an international work environment and for a stay in Germany. The use of remote laboratories plays an important role. The course concept and findings are explained on the basis of the first course edition in 2014.

What students use: Results of a survey on media use among engineering students

Nowadays, university students are facing a large number of highly diverse media, including conventional books as well as online-based mobile applications - all used to support learning. Especially the internet with its connected social media services or e-learning possibilities induced significant changes in society and in the landscape of higher education during the last years and still do so. The four universities RWTH Aachen University, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology conducted an exploratory student survey on media and information use, in order to expand the empirical database on that topic. A special focus was laid on mobile learning. In this context the survey asked for hardware and software the students are using and for those situations where they already got in contact with any kind of mobile learning - e.g. by using special apps for learning or because they were asked by their teachers to use a mobile device. The results of the survey elucidate that the use of online media and especially social media as well as mobile devices in higher education are in need to be promoted in future. Furthermore, it reveals demands for action in the field of media competency concerning students as well as teachers.

Entwicklung von Remote-Labs zum erfahrungsbasierten Lernen

In den Ingenieurwissenschaften bietet das Lernen in Laboren ein besonderes Potenzial zum Erwerb auch auserfachlicher Kompetenzen, das in der Regel jedoch kaum genutzt wird. Das Beispiel eines fernsteuerbaren Labors mit einer Lernumgebung, die unterschiedliche Lernpfade einbindet, zeigt, wie erfahrungsbasiertes Lernen in der Hochschule ermoglicht werden kann.