Using Website Building As a Project Based Learning ...

Proceedings of the International Conference on Trends and Innovations in Language Teaching – TILT 2014, 14&15 Nov. 2014, Sathyabama University, Chennai

Using Website Building As a Project Based Learning (PBL) Tool to Enhance Engineering Students’ Technical Writing Skills Shahila Zafar

Jancy Nandhini Feleciya

Zaved Ahmed Khan

Assistant Professor (Sr.), School of Social Sciences and Languages, VIT University, Vellore, [email protected]

Research Assistant. School of Social Sciences and Languages, VIT University, Vellore, [email protected]

School of Bio Sciences and Technology, VIT University, Vellore, [email protected]

Abstract--This paper addresses the question of how technical writing skills of engineering students can be improved through the process of website building using the Project Based Learning (PBL) method. The study involved building of 30 websites by 120 undergraduate students in groups of 3-5 students each in a technical writing class at VIT University, Vellore. The students were required to create these websites on the theme of ‘Future Technology Needed for VIT’. In addition, they were given the task of creating content for these websites keeping in mind all the requirements of effective technical writing that had already been discussed in class. These individual websites were then graded based on the criteria for a good website and a frequency table was generated to represent the results. At the end of the project, feedback from students was collected to bring out the students’ opinion on the implementation of the PBL approach to help develop their technical writing skills. After the analyses of both the quantitative data and the feedback of the students, it was found that the websites fulfilled most of the criteria for a good website. It was also revealed that the student’s motivation to do well and to come up with professional pieces of technical writing increased considerably when they were exposed to real world situations. Keywords- engineering education; future technology; project based learning; technical writing; website building

I.

INTRODUCTION

Technology is becoming an increasingly important part of the language classroom for improving the practical language usage skills of the students. The use of a varied set of technologies like overhead projectors, interactive white boards, language learning software, apps, blogs etc. in the classrooms provides not only an informal but also an interactive atmosphere for the learners. This use of innovative methods in educational institutions has the potential of not only generating interest and motivating students, but also of improving the overall quality of language education itself [1]. Now-a-days, most of the engineering colleges in India have integrated technical communication into their curriculum as a part of their English language courses. One of the main reasons behind this is the MNCs and other potential employers looking for engineering graduates with basic skills in computers and technical communication in English. [2]. As language skills play a prominent role in every aspect of both the professional and the personal domains, the students need to be proficient in English language and communication skills

like listening, speaking, reading and writing (LSRW), irrespective of their educational standards. Hence, this makes it mandatory for many educational institutions to revise their curriculum making sure that these basic skills are included and imparted to the students through the use of various approaches and methods in teaching. In order to facilitate the language learning process, various methods of teaching and learning need to be employed. Effective implementation of such methods has become one of the most important concerns as far as second language acquisition (SLA) is taken into account [3]. It has been found that adopting a learner-centered approach and focusing on communicative language teaching is a key to facilitatingthe learning process and enhancing the communicative competence of a learner. In a learner- centered approach, the focus of activity shifts from the teachers to the learners, thus paving the way to cooperative, collaborative learning. Here the students work together in groups or in pairs as per the demands of the task. Through this way, both teaching and learning becomes an enjoyable and a rewarding activity, thereby making it easier for students to understand the lesson since they are actively involved in the learning [4]. Project Based Learning (PBL) is one such widely used learner-centered approach. John Dewey, an American educational theorist, promoted the idea of ‘Learning by Doing’. This idea has advanced into what we now call Project Based Learning (PBL) Method. PBL can simply be defined as an “instructional approach that conceptualizes learning by presenting learners with problems to solve or products to develop [5].” In other words, the emphasis in PBL is on applying or integrating knowledge rather than acquiring it as in the case of Problem Based Learning. According to Dewey, “Education is not a preparation for life; education is life itself” [6]. Going hand-in-hand with this idea is the PBL approach/method. Students are given real life situations to work/face with. Hence, there is a lot of scope for interaction among fellow students/learners and the teachers’ role is limited to only as facilitators and they, thereby, do not hinder the individuals’ thought process. Here, in this studentcentered approach, the students take full responsibility for their learning. The main goal is to give students a general competence in project work and an awareness of general problem solving methods, while in the rest of the curriculum, the focus shifts to more specific technical and scientific objectives.

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Proceedings of the International Conference on Trends and Innovations in Language Teaching – TILT 2014, 14&15 Nov. 2014, Sathyabama University, Chennai

In the PBL approach, the students are involved in collaborative learning, but at the same time they get to learn on their own. During this self-directed learning, the students work together in groups, discussing, reviewing, comparing, etc., and developing and utilizing their problem solving skills.The team projects in PBL have a contextual focus enabling students to understand why they are learning the particular content and how it will be applied in the ‘real world’. In the specific case of language learning, PBL is characterized by the following principles [5]: • Builds on previous work; • Integrates speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills; • Incorporates collaborative team work, problem solving, negotiating and other interpersonal skills; • Requires learners to engage in independent work; • Challenges learners to use English in new and different contexts outside the class; • Involves learners in choosing the focus of the project and in the planning process; • Engages learners in acquiring new information that is important to them; • Leads to clear outcomes; and Incorporates selfevaluation, peer evaluation, and teacher evaluation.

They were asked to collaborate with each other, get regular feedback from the instructor and make mid-term review presentations of their ongoing project. Towards the end of the semester, the groups finished their projects and submitted their work for assessment. Web links to their websites can be found on the following webpage: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8FchB3PeZoFUG5tU05KaE R4MG8/view?usp=sharing C. Data Collection and Analysis In order to answer the research question as to how technical writing skills can be improved through the process of website building using thePBL method, data was obtained from the following sources: a) Frequency table:It was used to calculate the frequency of fulfilling the specified criteria for website building after a close study of different websites created by different projectgroups. A frequency table was generated using SPSS 16.0. b) Feedback from students: Feedback was taken to get the participants’ opinion on the usefulness of the PBL method vis- a-vis the traditional method of teaching and examination. A frequency table was generated using SPSS 16.0. III.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

For the last few years, VIT University, Vellore has been using the PBL approach as the “key to improving the employability skills, including the technical writing skills,of the students to prepare them for various workplaces” [7].

The results derived from the frequency table are given below followed by an analysis of the feedback from the students:

Communicating by using technology, such as web pages, help files, or social media sites etc. involves technical writing skills for conveying content to audience through specific, clear and concise writing. As technical writing skills occupy a significant role in developing websites, in the process of building a website, decisions need to be made regarding the technical requirements of the task.

A. Frequency Table Finally, 30 websites created by the students were evaluated on the basis of criteria for a good website [8], which included seven broad categories namely, audience recognition and involvement, home page, linked pages, navigation, document design, style and accuracy. These were further divided into the following 26 sub categories (See Annexure I)

II.

METHODOLOGY

A. The Participants The present study aimed to examine the effectiveness of the PBL method in improving the learners’ technical writing skills in website building. 120 engineering students in two different technical writing classes at VIT University, Vellore were involved. They belonged to various branches of engineering. The students were required to take up a few courses on communication skills in the first few semesters. The communication skills coursesare specially designed to improve the students’ technical writing skills in English. The main objective of the course is to teach the students to apply the theoretical knowledge and skills in writing emails, resumes, memos, reports etc. B. Procedure 37 groups, with 3-5 students in each were involved in the study.At the beginning of the semester, the students were asked to build websites on the theme ‘Future technology needed for VIT University’. After deciding on the specific topic based on the given theme, the students got the approval of their ideas from the instructor and proceeded with their projects. They were required to apply their learnt knowledge of technical writing in designing and writing for a website.

The websites created by students included topics like Health O meter, Biometric attendance, Carbon Nano Technology, Future Power, Noise Abatement, Power Shoes, Online Book Databaseetc. (see web links for the details). As shown in Annexure-I, it was found that among the 30 websites created, 26 websites fulfilled almost all the criterion sorted out to make a good website. Some of the basic criteria that were used to evaluate this were whether the websites met the reader’s needs, gave the audience a reason to return, used pronouns to engage the readers,provided identification information, had appealing graphics to represent the products, provided welcome or introductory phrase, developed ideas thoroughly, had a concise content, effective background and colour, consistent document design, used highlighting techniques and so on. Satisfactory results were found in the use of pronouns to engage the readers and identification information. 24 websites did not use hypertexts that provided access to other websites. Moreover,9 websites ensured correct and current information while 21 failed to do so. B. Feedback from Students At the end of the project, feedback was collected from the students on their experienceof and opinion on the implementation of the PBL method in helping them to

187 978-1-4799-7238-8/14/$31.00©2014 IEEE

Proceedings of the International Conference on Trends and Innovations in Language Teaching – TILT 2014, 14&15 Nov. 2014, Sathyabama University, Chennai

improve their technical writing skills.The students believed that through the project not only had their writing skills enhanced but also their reading, speaking and typing skills improved. This was because they had to look out for information from various sources that suited their project and present them. They also felt that working in groups enhanced collaborative learning skills, where they shared their ideas, sorted out problems if any and the solutions for it working together[9]. This data was also used along with the frequency table to determine the results of the study The findings from this study, as well as from a large number of studies already done in this area[10], reveal that implementation of PBL activities has the greater advantage of allowing the students to integrate both their language skills and their content knowledge to complete their projects. Though hesitant in the beginning by the challenge posed to them, the students then gained interest and motivation on realization that they had to practically apply their knowledge into real world situations. As suggested by Wilkerson [11], PBL approach is primarily student-centred and thereby, the student takes up the full responsibility for his or her learning. Through this method, the students realized that writing skills occupy an important role in field of technical writing, especially while developing websites and writing content to it. It has been observed that web based projects encourage students’ involvement in challenging and authentic tasks. Therefore, these types of approaches have a greater potential of increasing the motivation and the performance of the learners, which in turn has a positive effect on their learning. IV.

S. Ritz. “Project Based Learning is the conduit for progressive change.”Buck Institute for Education. Viewed 13 Oct 2014. Available http://bie.org/blog/project_based_learning_conduit_progressive_ch ange [5] Moss, D., & Van Duzer, C. (1998). Project-based learning for adult English learners. Eric. Digest. Viewed on October 20, 2014. Availablehttp://www.ericdigest.org/1999-4/project.htm [6] J. Dewey, Education and Experience, New York. Touchstone, 1938/1997 [7] P. Kornwipa, “Enhancing English Skills through Project Based Learning,” The English Teacher, vol. 60, pp.1-10, 2011 [8] J.S. Gerson, and S.M. Gerson,Technical Writing: Process and Product, Fifth Edition, India: Pearson Education, 2007, pp. 422435. [9] P. Gu, “Web-Based Project Learning and EFL learners: A Chinese Example,”Teaching English with Technology, vol. 2,pp.14-28, 2002. [10] Sage, S. M. (1996). A qualitative examination of problem-based learning at the K-8 level:Preliminary findings. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the AmericanEducational Research Association, New York. (ED 398 263). [11] L. Wilkerson, Bringing Problem-based Learning to higher education: Theory and Practice, in New Directions for Teaching and Learning, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1996

Annexure I Website Usability Checklist 1. Audience Recognition and Involvement

CONCLUSION

2. Home Page

As discussed above, the students can practice their evolving technical communication skills in situations that seem realistic. This methodology provides the ability to students to be immersed in pseudo real world scenarios, thus encouraging them to take more responsibility for their own learning and to apply their knowledge at different levels. The present study involvedexploratory investigation thatfurther revealed that the use of PBL methods increase students’ motivation to do well and to come up with professional pieces of technical writing.Future studies can focus on using a variety of such project-basedactivities in the classroom and using other measures to examine improvement inlearners’ languageskills. V.

[4]

viii. ix. x. xi.

4. Navigation

xii.

REFERENCES

[2]

[3]

S. Mahmood, “Teaching English to Engineering students through Innovative Techniques,” J. of Education and Practice, vol. 5, pp.192-197, Feb. 2014. G.R. Sinha. “Need to Focus on Developing Employability Skills in our Engineering Graduates.” ( October 18, 2014).India Education Review.Viewed October 21, 2014. Available:http://www.indiaeducationreview.com/article/needfocus-developing-employability-skills-our-engineering-graduates F. Myles, R. Mitchell, and J. Hooper, “Interrogative Chunks in French L2: A Basis for Creative Construction?,”Studies in Second Language Acquisition, vol. 21, pp.49-80, 1999.

6. Style

7. Accuracy

xiii. xiv. xv. xvi. xvii. xviii. xix. xx. xxi. xxii. xxiii. xxiv. xxv.

xxvi.

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v. vi.

3. Linked Pages

We would like to thank the School of Social Sciences and Languages, VIT University, Vellore for providing exceptional support for this study.

[1]

iii. iv.

vii.

5. Document Design

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

i. ii.

Meets readers’ needs? Gives audience a reason to return Feedback & customer comments Use pronouns to engage readers? Identification information Has appealing graphics representing products? Gives welcoming & introductory phrase? Provides hypertext links? Provides a clear heading? Develop ideas thoroughly? Limited to 1 or 2 primary topics? Allows easy return from LP (Linked Pages) to HP (Home page)? Easy movement between LPs? Provide access to other websites Provides effective background? Use of color Has consistent document design? Uses headings & subheadings? Varying font size & type? Effective use of graphics Use of highlighting techniques Conciseness of the website Requires minimized need to scroll Grammatical errors Ensures correct & current information (phone no., contact address etc.) Has workable Internal & external links