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Educators question whether performing a laboratory experiment as an observer (non-hands-on), such as conducted in a distance education context, can be as effective a learning tool as personally performing the experiment in a laboratory environment. The present paper investigates this issue by comparing the performance of distance education students with their on-campus counterparts in a junior-level fluid mechanics laboratory course over a three semester period. Using digital recording methods, the on-campus versions of the laboratory experiments were formatted to accommodate distance-education students who did not have access to campus facilities. This paper compares the assessment of student performance in demonstrating both learning of technical concepts and the ability to describe these in an effective written laboratory report. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the procedures used to assess the extent that a team of students, and the individual students in it, has mastered the competencies set for a student team-based open-ended project. The paper addresses questions such as: why examine team-based project work? What and when to examine? What are the essential regulations and boundary conditions? Who examines whom? The discussion is based mainly on practices followed in the University of Twente (the Netherlands) and elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we have explored how students in a cross-disciplinary course on engineering and social justice approached the idea of using social justice as a lens for looking at engineering. We have used an adapted phenomenographic approach [Marton, F., and Booth, S., 1997. Learning and awareness. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum], together with Meyer and Land's [Meyer, J.H.F., and Land, R., 2003. Threshold concepts and troublesome knowledge: linkages to ways of thinking and practising within the disciplines. ETL Project Occasional Report 4 [online]. Available from: http://www.tla.ed.ac.uk/etl/docs/ETLreport4.pdf [Accessed 1 January 2009]] threshold concept framework, to study the variation present among the students in the class as they attempt to pass through the threshold of this lens. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with students. We examine the liminal space that students hover in for several weeks, not knowing whether or if they will eventually pass through the portal into new territories. We found nine conceptions of increasing complexity present among the students in the class. We suggest that the students' collective experiences illustrate potential journeys along a spectrum of liminality and through the threshold. We conclude with some implications for what can be done to facilitate the students' transition through the threshold, thereby contributing to the development of this aspect of engineering education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Second language acquisition is a hard task for teachers, since to achieve the motivation from students to practice a language simulating a real context is very difficult. On the one hand, students are often influenced by their mother tongue and more when they are practising a second language with a partner from the same nationality. On the other, technology is part of our lives and teachers should use all the tools in order to motivate students to learn any topic. So, if we integrate technology in the methodology we use when teaching a second language and students can practise with international partners, the results can be surprising. Chats, scanning texts, games, filling forms, etc. are just some of the activities our students can do in order to improve their command of a second language and also these activities can be used by content teachers in order to complement content learning. In the present paper, we provide some examples of activities designed by collaborating with content teachers based on websites, and then we analyse the effect they produced on students. We contrast the methodology used to propose tasks based on websites and those based on texts, and finally, evaluate their effect on the motivation of students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessment in engineering disciplines is typically oriented to demonstrating competence in specific tasks. Even where assessments are intended to have a formative component, little priority may be given to feedback. Engineering departments are often criticized, by their students and by external quality reviewers, for paying insufficient attention to formative assessment. The e3an project set out to build a question bank of peer-reviewed questions for use within electrical and electronic engineering. As a part of this process, a number of engineers from disparate institutions were required to work together in teams, designing a range of assessments for their subject specialisms. The project team observed that lecturers were especially keen to develop formative assessment but that their understanding of what might be required varied considerably. This paper describes the various ways in which the processes of the project have engaged lecturers in actively identifying and developing their conceptions of teaching, learning and assessment in their subject. It reports on an interview study that was conducted with a selection of participants. It is concluded that lecturers' reflections on and understanding of assessment are closely related to the nature of the subject domain and that it is essential when attempting to improve assessment practice to start from the perspective of lecturers in the discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A well-designed assessment strategy can motivate students, and help teachers and institutions to support deep learning. In contrast, inappropriate forms of assessment may promote surface learning, and will therefore fail to support the true goals of education. Recent theories of learning stress the value of dialogue, negotiation and feedback. Learning is seen to take place within communities of practice, where members collaborate to construct an understanding of their field of study. Assessment within such communities can help provide the feedback and shared meanings essential to membership. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) can facilitate the best aspects of assessment. Possibilities range from simple web-based tests for practice and self-assessment, through facilitation and assessment of group work, to recent developments in semantic analysis for automatic marking. Drawing on the lessons of learning theories, this paper explores how ICTs can support best practice in assessment for engineering education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The issue of addressing innovation and change in engineering students' assessment is the target of this paper. The contents are an overview of the issues related to the evolution of the engineering learning requirements, a review of the traditional student evaluation methods in practice, a description of a current experiment in engineering student assessment and an analysis of the possible consequences of the generalized adoption of the innovative method. The pilot project consisted of the experimentation of an evaluation system without a final exam for a chosen discipline per semester and per each year of the several undergraduate degrees. The comparison is made in statistical terms and relevance when comparing the results of each chosen discipline between the actual and the previous year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the end of a lecturing period examinations are used to take a snapshot of the level of knowledge of a student. It is essential that this snapshot be taken at the right moment. Particularly when a student fails, it is important to make sure that it is because his level of knowledge is not adequate, not because, for example, he had a severe headache, was blocked by examination stress or misread the questions. Even when a student does pass, it may be that the grade is too low because of unjust causes. The system presented in this paper is designed to prevent this situation. An automated Internet-based system makes multiple-choice tests available for students of which the contents depend on the date. It tracks the actual course content. When a student does a test, the system will grade the student and predict the official grade that can be expected at the final examination. The results of the final examination are compared with the prediction. When the prediction is higher than the actual grade, the cause is investigated and possibly an extra assessment is done. The system is completely automated and is available for students 24 h per day. This makes sure that the snapshot is taken at the right time, since the student himself can decide when to take a test. The system does not officially grade the students and is therefore not very sensitive to fraud, but it efficiently removes the ‘snapshot risk’ of the official exam, resulting in a much better quality of the grading process [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2000 the UK Engineering Professors' Council (EPC) drafted an output standard to describe first-cycle engineering programmes that would prepare students for practice and further professional learning. The standard described what is authentic and worthwhile in engineering education—it identified complex outcomes of learning. This poses practical and theoretical challenges: how can we know if a student has met this standard? This paper argues that complex outcomes like these often resist measurement and that it is appropriate to use other forms of judgement when trying to assess student achievement. This differentiated approach to assessment, which values formative assessment (or feedback) as well as summative assessment (or feedout), is summarized. It becomes necessary, then, to think about the assessment arrangements for whole programmes, not just for individual modules. Some implications of this programmic and differentiated approach are explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with a model to improve the teaching-learning process, using a participatory and interactive strategy. This strategy uses a joint decision-making model that includes teachers and students. So, the purpose of this study is to describe a model containing basic strategies for shaping suitable behaviours to professional actions (content of the minimum curriculum of various engineering programmes), through different approaches, by applying it to the teaching-learning process. Through a practical, interactive and experiential process it is possible to convey characteristics, positive and negative points, and ways of implementation of each of the approaches considered to students, and at the same time introduce behaviour-shaping strategies into the teaching-learning process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]