Identifying Freehand Sectional View Technical Drawing Activities in Engineering Design Graphics Course to Enhance Spatial Skills of Engineering Students

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anirudh Srinivasan ◽  
Jeremy D. Smith ◽  
Diana Bairaktarova
Keyword(s):  
Engineering Design ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Spatial Thinking ◽  
Spatial Skills ◽  
Santa Barbara ◽  
Technical Drawing ◽  
Positive Correlations ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Purdue Spatial Visualization Test ◽  
Engineering Design Graphics

Spatial thinking is paramount in engineering education, however there is a lack of reliable data on instructional strategies for developing and improving these skills. In this pilot study, we investigate the feasibility of using students’ freehand sectional view drawings to measure their initial and developing spatial skills in a semester-long engineering design graphics course. Participants included 121 junior-level students (M = 98, F = 23). Preliminary results show moderate-to-strong positive correlations between drawing accuracy and performance on two spatial thinking tests: the Purdue Spatial Visualization Test (PSVT:R), and Santa Barbara Solids Test (SBST).

Visualization, Intuition, and Mathematics Metrics as Predictors of Undergraduate Engineering Design Performance

2007 ◽  
Vol 129 (7) ◽  
pp. 735-743 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce W. Field
Keyword(s):  
Problem Solving ◽  
Engineering Design ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Right Hemisphere ◽  
Correlation Coefficients ◽  
Spatial Skills ◽  
Undergraduate Engineering ◽  
Spatial Skill ◽  
Highly Correlated ◽  
Willingness To Use

Many undergraduate engineering students perform relatively poorly in design courses, even though they are otherwise academically very strong. Some average students perform exceptionally well in design courses. While there are generally strong correlations between the results that each student gains at university, the design outcomes seem somewhat anomalous. It is hypothesized that some of the variation in relative success at design courses is due to the influence of otherwise unused and unmeasured nonacademic attributes. One clue to the existence of additional attributes exploited in design courses arises from an appreciation of “hemispheric preference,” since many of the special tasks in design projects rely on creativity, holistic problem solving, visualization, and intuition; skills normally associated with the brain’s right hemisphere. Students in the second year of the engineering program at Monash University were tested for spatial skill, and completed a management survey that identified their willingness to use intuition during problem solving. Separately, their grades in a series of mathematics and computing courses were obtained, and the set of results was grouped in a multiple regression against their engineering design grades. Whereas the correlation coefficients for the students’ paired grades in several mathematics and other analytical courses were all high, the correlation coefficient between mathematics and their grade in engineering design was weak, but significant. However, when measures of their spatial skills and their willingness to use intuition were factored with their mathematics grade, the composite score was highly correlated with a student’s design grade. It was concluded that while general academic competence was of prime importance, a student’s spatial skill and their comfort in making assumptions were important factors in predicting their design grade.

Standards, Codes of Practice and Expert Systems

1988 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-9 ◽  
Author(s):  
E G McCluskey ◽  
S Thompson ◽  
D M G McSherry
Keyword(s):  
Expert System ◽  
Expert Systems ◽  
Engineering Design ◽  
Performance Criteria ◽  
Design Problems ◽  
Codes Of Practice ◽  
Engineering Design Problems ◽  
And Performance

Many engineering design problems require reference to standards or codes of practice to ensure that acceptable safety and performance criteria are met. Extracting relevant data from such documents can, however, be a problem for the unfamiliar user. The use of expert systems to guide the retrieval of information from standards and codes of practice is proposed as a means of alleviating this problem. Following a brief introduction to expert system techniques, a tool developed by the authors for building expert system guides to standards and codes of practice is described. The steps involved in encoding the knowledge contained in an arbitrarily chosen standard are illustrated. Finally, a typical consultation illustrates the use of the expert system guide to the standard.

A Pillar of Mechanical Engineering Design Education in Australia: 25 Years of the Warman Design and Build Competition

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Warren F. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Engineering Design ◽  
Design Education ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Student Assessment ◽  
National Committee ◽  
Engineering Design Education ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Institutional Learning ◽  
History Of

The “Warman Design and Build Competition”, running across Australasian Universities, is now in its 26th year in 2013. Presented in this paper is a brief history of the competition, documenting the objectives, yearly scenarios, key contributors and champion Universities since its beginning in 1988. Assuming the competition has reached the majority of mechanical and related discipline engineering students in that time, it is fair to say that this competition, as a vehicle of the National Committee on Engineering Design, has served to shape Australasian engineering education in an enduring way. The philosophy of the Warman Design and Build Competition and some of the challenges of running it are described in this perspective by its coordinator since 2003. In particular, the need is for the competition to work effectively across a wide range of student group ability. Not every group engaging with the competition will be competitive nationally, yet all should learn positively from the experience. Reported also in this paper is the collective feedback from the campus organizers in respect to their use of the competition as an educational experience in their classrooms. Each University participating uses the competition differently with respect to student assessment and the support students receive. However, all academic campus organizer responses suggest that the competition supports their own and their institutional learning objectives very well. While the project scenarios have varied widely over the years, the intent to challenge 2nd year university (predominantly mechanical) engineering students with an open-ended statement of requirements in a practical and experiential exercise has been a constant. Students are faced with understanding their opportunity and their client’s value system as expressed in a scoring algorithm. They are required to conceive, construct and demonstrate their device with limited prior knowledge and experience, and the learning outcomes clearly impact their appreciation for teamwork, leadership and product realization.

Can Induced Gratitude Improve Creative Performance on Repurposing Tasks?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Natalie M. Sisson ◽  
Emily Impett ◽  
L.H. Shu
Keyword(s):  
Engineering Design ◽  
Environmental Sustainability ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Small Body ◽  
Design Creativity ◽  
Creativity Research ◽  
Full Study ◽  
Societal Problems ◽  
First Time

Abstract Urgent societal problems, including climate change, require innovation and can benefit from interdisciplinary solutions. A small body of research has demonstrated the potential of positive emotions (e.g., gratitude, awe) to promote creativity and prosocial behavior, which may help address these problems. This study integrates, for the first time, psychology research on a positive and prosocial emotion (i.e., gratitude) with engineering-design creativity research. In a pre-registered study design, engineering students and working engineers (pilot N = 49; full study N = 329) completed gratitude, positive-emotion control, or neutral-control inductions. Design creativity was assessed through rater scores of responses to an Alternate Uses Task (AUT) and a Wind-Turbine-Blade Repurposing Task (WRT). No significant differences among AUT scores emerged across conditions in either sample. While only the pilot-study manipulation of gratitude was successful, WRT results warrant further studies on the effect of gratitude on engineering-design creativity. The reported work may also inform other strategies to incorporate prosocial emotion to help engineers arrive at more original and effective concepts to tackle environmental sustainability, and in the future, other problems facing society.

Development of a DSM-Based Methodology in an Academic Setting

2012 ◽  
Vol 134 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
George Platanitis ◽  
Remon Pop-Iliev ◽  
Ahmad Barari
Keyword(s):  
Engineering Design ◽  
Design Process ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Design Structure ◽  
Academic Settings ◽  
Task Durations ◽  
Random Disturbances ◽  
Process Convergence ◽  
Work Transformation

This paper proposes the use of a design structure matrix/work transformation matrix (DSM/WTM)-based methodology in academic settings to serve engineering educators as a facilitating tool for predetermining the difficulty and feasibility of design engineering projects they assign, given both the time constraints of the academic term and the expected skill level of the respective learners. By using a third-year engineering design project as a case study, engineering students actively participated in this comprehensive use of DSM methodologies. The engineering design process has been thoroughly analyzed to determine convergence characteristics based on the eigenvalues of the system followed by a sensitivity analysis on the originally determined DSM based on data provided by students in terms of task durations and number of iterations for each task. Finally, an investigation of the design process convergence due to unexpected events or random disturbances has been conducted. The obtained predictive model of the design process was compared to the actual dynamics of the project as experienced by the students and the effect of random disturbances at any point in the design process has thereby been evaluated.

CAD Platform Independent Software for Automatic Grading of Technical Drawings

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanchit Ingale ◽  
Anirudh Srinivasan ◽  
Diana Bairaktarova
Keyword(s):  
Engineering Students ◽  
Spatial Reasoning ◽  
Learning Experience ◽  
Spatial Visualization ◽  
First Year ◽  
Spatial Skills ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Pedagogical Tool ◽  
Students Success ◽  
Mechanical Objects

Spatial visualization is the ability of an individual to imagine an object mentally and understand its spatial orientation. There have been multiple works proving that spatial visualization skills can be improved with an appropriate training. Such training warrant a critical place in the undergraduate engineering curricula in many engineering schools as spatial skills are considered vital for students’ success in the technical and design fields [1–4]. Enhanced spatial skills help not only professionals in the engineering field but also everyone in the 21st century environment. Drawing sectional views requires mental manipulation and visual thinking. To enhance students spatial reasoning, one of the authors of this study, conducted a class in spatial visualization. The course-learning goal aimed at improving first-year engineering students’ spatial reasoning through instruction on freehand drawings of sectional view. During the semester, two teaching assistants had to grade more than 500 assignments that consisted of sectional views of mechanical objects. This was a tedious and a time consuming task. Motivated by this experience, this paper proposes a software aiming at automating grading of students’ sectional view drawings. The proposed software will also give live feedback to students while they are working on the drawings. This interactive tool aims to 1) improve the learning experience of first year students, with limited CAD knowledge, and 2) introduce a pedagogical tool that can enhance spatial visualization training.

scholarly journals Correlations of intake, digestibility and performance with the ingestive behavior of lambs fed diets containing ammoniated buffel grass hay

2016 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 1551 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandre Fernandes Perazzo ◽  
Sansão De Paula Homem Neto ◽  
Ossival Lolato Ribeiro ◽  
Edson Mauro Santos ◽  
Gleidson Giordano Pinto de Carvalho ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Weight Gain ◽  
Average Daily Gain ◽  
Neutral Detergent Fiber ◽  
Ingestive Behavior ◽  
Favorable Effect ◽  
Feeding Time ◽  
Buffel Grass ◽  
Grass Hay ◽  
Positive Correlations ◽  
And Performance

<p>This study aimed to evaluate the correlations of intake, digestibility and performance with the ingestive behavior of lambs fed diets containing ammoniated buffel grass hay. Buffel grass hay was treated with four levels of urea (0, 18, 36 and 54 g/kg DM basis) and eight repetitions. Thirty-two sheep with no defined breed and an average body weight of 17.7 ± 1.8 kg were distributed in a completely randomized design. It was observed positive correlations were found between the feeding time and the intake of dry matter (r = 0.3120), organic matter (r = 0.3242), neutral detergent fiber (r = 0.3800), total carbohydrates (r = 0.3343) and total digestible nutrients (r = 0.3233). Positive correlations (P &lt; 0.05) were found among the rumination efficiencies, g of DM/h and g of NDF/h with nutrient intake variables, except for ether extract intake. Positive correlations were observed (P &lt; 0.05) between both total weight gain (TWG) and average daily gain (ADG) and the rumination efficiency, g of DM/h (r = 0.3330) and g of NDF/h (r = 0.3304). The feeding and rumination efficiencies have a positive relationship with the total digestible nutrients. The correlation among intake, digestibility and performance variables with the ingestive behavior, it was important for the understanding of diet containing ammoniated buffel grass hay, in which the positive correlation of rumination efficiency with intake and weight gain explained the favorable effect on productive performance of feedlot sheep.</p><p><strong> </strong></p>

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