Taught by experience - an approach to integrated learning for first year students in Electrical Engineering.

Abstract

The OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) provides a

list of key competencies which current learners/student should acquire to be future-

proof. The three key competencies are „(1) Use tools (language, technology…)

interactively“, „(2) Act autonomously“ and „(3) Interact in heterogeneous groups“.

Traditional teaching focuses on providing information. I redesigned the structure of

my class “Electrical Engineering” (EE) for first year Bachelor students in order to

provide not only fact knowledge transfer, but also to gain and improve said key

competencies. In my talk I will present methods and materials, I use, to give my

students that expertise. The class format has been changed to an inverted

classroom concept. In preparation of the course, the class students work self-paced

on teaching videos and easy test questions to gain basic knowledge about a topic

(Key 2). In class, students are stimulated to get into discussion with their colleagues

via Peer Instruction (PI) questions. To support the discussion between students (Key

3), small whiteboards are handed to student-groups at the beginning of each class.

Besides, those whiteboards are used for solving assignments during class time. A

supervisor can walk through the room and assesses the progress of the teams.

Solutions or mistakes that are worth discussing are presented in the plenum by

streaming the whiteboard via a document camera. The teacher establishes a positive

148culture of failure, as there is no blaming and shaming, but collaborative learning. The

whiteboards are a game changer in the attendance time.

To encourage the use of different tools (Key 1), simulations of ideal electrical

components are integrated in the teaching part. For showing the difference to real

live, electrical components as resistor, multimeters etc. were handed to the students

during class for guided experiments. This trains scientific working along the lines of

thesis - experiment - result - conclusion, but also forces students to think about the

differences between ideal models and reality. The modified course concept has been

widely complimented by students, stating they are very happy to be in that class and

feel well prepared for the exam.

EuroSOTL Proceedings 2022, C. Niebler