Implementing the New Way Learning Process in Engineering

tudents can learn in many ways by observing; reflecting and acting; reasoning logically; memorizing and visualizing, drawing analogies and building mathematical models. Sometimes teaching methods can also vary. Some instructors prefer lectures, others demonstrate or discuss; some focus on principles and others on direct applications; some emphasize memory and others optimize understanding. How much a given student learns in a class is governed in part by the board and the responsible members of the respective university. Clashes actually exist in between common learning styles of engineering students and traditional teaching styles of engineering professors. The result of these consequences are that students become bore, do poorly in tests, get discouraged about the courses, the curriculum, and themselves, and in some cases drop out of college. 

Professors confronted by low-test grades, unresponsive or hostile classes, poor attendance, and dropouts, may become overly critical of their students; which make things even worse or student’s begin to wonder if they have chosen the right profession. The serious impact of this is society loses potentially excellent engineers.

All engineering professors and students must know the following things:

1) What are the requirements of learning style, particularly significant in engineering education?

2) The professors need to introspect which learning styles most students prefer and which are favored teaching styles of most professors?

 

Learning in a structured educational setting is a two-step process involving reception and processing of information. In the reception step, external in-formation and internal information become available to students, who select the material they will process and ignore the rest.

The processing may involve simple memorization, inductive or deductive reasoning, reflection or action, and introspection or interaction. The outcome is that the concept may or may not be learned. A learning-style classifies students according to where they fit on a number of scales pertaining to the ways they receive and process information. Most of the learning and teaching style components are parallel to one another. A student who favors intuitive over sensory perception, for example, would respond well to an instructor who emphasizes concepts rather than facts. A student who favors visual perception would be most comfortable with an instructor who uses charts, pictures, and films. The one exception is the reflective learning style dimension and the active/passive teaching style dimension, which do not exactly correspond.

 

As students of Engineering, an individual must have practical knowledge or one can say in terms of application. However, sometimes only practical knowledge is not sufficient for scoring

It needs strong concepts. Therefore, the students must have to balance their studies in both ways. The responsibility of colleges is to create such learning environment for students where they can gain both. Creation of environment should be for both professors and students. Professors also have to leave traditional way of teaching and have to start implementing the new methodology of teaching. Top colleges in Pune provides such environment for both students and faculties.

 

 

Few suggestions:

1. As much as possible, relate the material being presented to the material in other courses as well, and particularly to the student’s personal experiences.

2. Follow the scientific method while presenting theoretical material. Provide concrete examples of the phenomenon which theory describes or predicts, then show how the theory is validated to the present applications.

1. Talk to students about learning methods.

2. Do not fill every minute of class time in lecturing and writing on the board. Provide small breaks.

3. Use pictures, schematics, graphs, and simple sketches liberally before, during, and after the presentation of verbal material. You can show films and can also provide demonstrations if possible.

4.  Applaud creative solutions, even incorrect ones.

5. Assign some drill exercises to provide practice in the basic methods which are being taught. However, do not overdo them. Also provide some open-ended problems and exercises that call for analysis and synthesis.

6. Balance material that emphasizes practical problem-solving methods with material that emphasizes fundamental understanding.

 

In this way a teaching method, becomes effective for students and comfortable for the professor, which will evolve naturally and relatively painlessly, with a potentially dramatic effect on the quality of learning that subsequently occurs. India's Educational & IT Hub, Pune's Best Colleges For Engineering with a placement assistance always tends to provide the same environment to the students and professor too, which can be seen as a reason behind the exceptionally talented Engineers.