Meeting the needs of Industry through Activity Led Learning

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• Meeting the needs of Industry through Activity
  Led Learning
• RAE June 10th 2009 Prof Peter White

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Presentation overview

• ALL Why What - How
• Pilot activity
• Design of spaces to facilitate ALL
• New Engineering and Computing Building

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Activity Led Learning

• Why?
• International evidence of the importance of
  professional skills
• Unacceptable rates of retention
• Improving student engagement and experience
• Meet industry needs expressed in Educating
  Engineers for the 21st century
• Encourage holistic student view
• Ability to develop/apply knowledge

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Learning through Activity

• What? - Origins
• Coventry 1989
• Aalborg 1974
• Queens, Ontario 1998
• Melbourne 1990s
• Brisbane 1997
• Boulder, Colorado 1990s
• Strathclyde 1996
• Dublin 2000s

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Learning through Activity

• Our evidence indicated
• Real (open ended) problems need to be
  incorporated into courses
• Professional skills are to be developed during
  the teaching/learning of engineering science,
  computing and mathematics
• Any course must stimulate and motivate the
  students
• Much good practice in EC and the University on
  which to build

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Learning through Activity

• Variant of Problem Based Learning
• Working in groups (not always)
• Assessed individually (where appropriate)
• Industrially Led Learning
• Industry focussed problems
• Activity Led Delivery
• Use of PRS/EVS
• Interactive using mini-problems, etc.

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Activity Led Learning

• The Faculty is committed to developing
  communities of learners through employer and
  profession focussed activity led education. In
  this stimulating environment students will become
  fully engaged in the learning process, resulting
  in them becoming highly employable graduates who
  are able to lead and develop society through
  their enhanced research, team working and project
  management skills.

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Activity Led Learning

• How?
• Specific time-constrained problems from business
  or research contexts, spanning discipline
  boundaries where appropriate
• Assign students to small groups at induction (or
  before?)
• Students learn from each other in groups

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Activity Led Learning

• How?
• Teach/coach students to work in groups
• Enhance group cohort identity
• Groups provide support for each other
• Subject Advisory Service - drop-in
• Ad hoc support
• Across the curriculum

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Pilot activity

• 6week pilot in Mechanical and Automotive
  Engineering
• 100 students in 6 groups
• 6 x 1 week exercises
• Design and build
• Metrology
• CAD modelling
• Materials testing
• Reverse engineering
• Product marketing

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Pilot activity

• Academics, development officers, technicians,
  interns facilitated and assessed the exercise
• 18 hours timetabled per week
• 2/3 hours key note instruction
• 14/15 hours facilitated activity
• 1 hour assessment
• Marks and feedback given at end of week

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Pilot activity results

• Effectiveness determined through closed and open
  questionnaires(79 completion) and focus groups
  for students and staff
• 26 improvement in satisfaction from closed
  questions (based on CU student satisfaction
  survey questions)
• Positives from experience based on open questions
  practical experience, working in a group,
  teaching methodology

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Pilot activity results

• 74 wanted more of this type of activity
• Drop out rates for term 1 fell from 3 to 0.9
• Areas for improvement were operational more
  break time, more assessment details
• Staff identified workload balancing, attendance
  patterns, competitive elements for engaging
  students

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Moving forward

• To be rolled out across the Faculty in 2009
  2010
• Projects and activities to be sought from and
  delivered by industry
• Staff training to be continued
• Facilitating spaces to be developed and fed into
  new building design see following slides

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Design for Collaborative Learning Collaborative
Classroom
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Design for Collaborative Learning Collaborative
Classroom
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Design for Collaborative Learning Student
Experience
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Design for Collaborative Learning The Interactive
Classroom
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Design for Collaborative Learning The Interactive
Zone
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Design for Collaborative Learning Interaction
Community Business Industry - Research
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Design for Collaborative Learning Interactive
Lecture Theatres
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Design for Collaborative Learning Open Plan
Workshop
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Design for Collaborative Learning Detailed Design
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