Pamela S. Lottero-Perdue

Elementary Teachers' Reflections on Design Failures and Use of Fail Words after Teaching Engineering for Two Years.

This mixed-methods study examines how teachers who have taught one or two units of the Engineering is Elementary (EiE) curriculum for two years reported on: students’ responses to design failure; the ways in which they, the teachers, supported these students and used fail words (e.g. fail, failure); and the teachers’ broad perspectives and messages to students about failure. In addition, the study explores how strategies, perspectives, messages, and fail word use may change after two years of engineering instruction. This study builds on previous work about elementary teachers’: perspectives on failure prior to teaching engineering, and responses to and perspectives on failure after teaching EiE unit(s) for one year. Data collected included 74 surveys, containing both quantitative and qualitative items, and ten indepth, semi-structured interviews. Quantitative data were analyzed via non-parametric methods, and qualitative analysis involved an iterative search for codes and themes. The convergent mixed-methods design enabled comparison across quantitative and qualitative findings. Findings included that the elementary engineering classroom is a complex space in which teams may or may not experience design failure; for those teams that do, they—and, in turn, their teachers—may respond to this experience in a wide range of ways. Also, after two years of teaching engineering, teachers felt more comfortable preparing students for design failure experiences, and responding when design failure occurred. Most also felt more comfortable using fail words, and when they used these words, learned to do so with context and care.

Perspectives on Failure in the Classroom by Elementary Teachers New to Teaching Engineering

This mixed methods study examines perspectives on failure in the classroom by elementary teachers new to teaching engineering. The study participants included 254 teachers in third, fourth, and fifth grade who responded to survey questions about failure, as well as a subset of 38 of those teachers who participated in interviews about failure. The study first examines the literature about failure in the contexts of engineering and education. Failure is positioned as largely normative and expected in engineering, whereas in education, learning and failure have a more tenuous relationship. Identity, failure avoidance, failure as part of the learning process, growth and fixed mindset, resilience, perseverance, and grit are addressed in a discussion of failure and education. Quantitative and qualitative research methods were utilized to examine how participants: reacted to the words failure or fail, reported allowing students to fail or revise their work, considered how failure should be avoided in education, considered how failure may be construed as a learning experience, and reported using the words failure or fail in their classrooms. Conclusions from the study include that: failure has a largely negative connotation within education and by teachers, which influences how teachers use the words fail and failure and create failure experiences for their students; many teachers practice resilience and perseverance and encourage similar practices in their students with respect to mistakes in the classroom, which serves as a helpful yet somewhat inaccurate analogue for failure in engineering design; and there is evidence that many teachers have adopted a growth mindset and encourage this mindset in their classrooms – however, there are some challenges to a true adoption of this mindset by teachers.

Engineering Professional Societies and Pre-University Engineering Education

Engineers have long formed professional and informal alliances to capitalize on synergies, address deficiencies and solve problems. The oldest engineering professional society in the United States (US), the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), was formed in 1852 (ASCE, 2015a). Today, ASCE is a global society, with nearly 150,000 members in 174 countries, and stands among dozens of other engineering societies.