Discovery Approach to Teaching Engineering Design

The current methodology to teach the design process to undergraduate engineering students emphasizes applications instead of conceptual understanding. Emphasis is not placed on either the recognition of the problem or the identification of alternative design options. Because of this lack of information, students are not able to fully recognize the importance of all phases of the design process. Our objective is to illustrate the use of a new educational method, the constructivist learning model (CLM), to show how the design process can be presented more effectively to undergraduate engineering students. The CLM approach to design includes the following five phases: engage, explore, expand, extend, and evaluate. Activities that illustrate each phase are presented. With specific examples, we will demonstrate how the CLM could be used to present the design process so that the students can discover it themselves, instead of being spoon-fed someone else's process. The CLM approach should increase student retention and creativity. The importance and evaluation of the CLM approach is discussed.