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Matthiesen, Sven; Eisenmann, Matthias; Hölz, Kevin; Six, Oliver

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Abstract:

One reason for a lack of engineers lies in pupils’ little knowledge of an engineer’s work. Thus, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) teachers should be able to convey this knowledge in order to promote pupils’ enthusiasm for engineering. To qualify those teachers for this task, they need to experience the work of an engineer themselves. At Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) a new course integrates STEM teaching-students in a mechatronics course using project-based learning to address this need. A study was conducted to answer the questions, (A) what STEM teaching students know about aspects of systematic engineering design before taking part in the course and (B) whether they can learn about those aspects by taking part in this interdisciplinary design course. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the students at the beginning and the end of the semester, transcribed and analysed qualitatively. Results show, that the students had little knowledge on systematic engineering design before taking part in the course. Also, all of them showed considerable learning at the end of semester, especially knowledge on validation and testing. So at this point, it seems the right way to integrate STEM teaching students in design teams in order to qualify them for conveying knowledge of an engineer’s work to school.

Keywords:

STEM-Fields, teaching-students, Interdisciplinary Design, Project-based learning