Designing effective writing and presentation assignments for Freshman engineering students

Abstract

When the University of South Carolina College of Engineering created its new Peshman year experience course in 1997, it established a Freshman Writing Program to integrate communications and writing skills into the curriculum. One component of the Freshman Writing Program, staffed by consultants in the College's communications and writing centers, is assistance to engineering faculty in structuring appropriate writing and oral presentation assignments for the course. The new freshman course at USC's College of Engineering, UlOl-E, combines core elements of USCs widely acclaimed University 101, the Freshman Year Experience course that helps students make the transition to college life. The new Engineering model of the course introduces students both to academic life and to engineering designs and disciplines. Communications assignments are integrated into the syllabus as a means of achieving course goals. Writing and presentation assignments complement students' explorations of the various engineering disciplines and their design project, as well as their responses to a variety of University programs and services. These assignments were developed collaboratively by the staff of the Freshman Writing Program and engineering faculty to help students synthesize and reflect on the material. The Writing Program staff also provided classroom instruction on communications topics and worked with Engineering faculty in developing methods for maluating student writing and oral reports. Engineering faculty and staff of the Writing Program found the collaboration helpful. Engineering faculty requested and received consultation that was speciJic to their immediate concerns, especially related to goals, teaching and measurement of Peshman writing. Faculw found writing-in-the-disciplines and writing-to-learn approaches recommended by consultants highly useful. Methods for articulating grading criteria and explaining them to students were also useful to the instructors as mechanisms for teaching communications skills. Staff of the Freshman Writing Program also benefited by learning the faculty's expectations of student writing. This knowledge enabled the consultants to provide more specific instruction on communications topics to students. After the first semester's experience, course faculty recommended that the Freshman Writing Program and Professional Communications Center be used as pre-andpost assignment resource for faculty and that the Writing Program be more closely integrated into the University 101-Engineering syllabus.

Relationships among learning community participation, student self-efficacy, confidence, outcome expectations, and commitment

“…The engineering literature provides many examples of institutional efforts to integrate writing and communication content into the core engineering curriculum (Crowley, 1998;Hendricks & Pappas, 1996;Larson et ai., 1998;Olds, 1998;Schulz & Ludlow, 1996;Sharp et al, 1999;Waitz & Barrett, 1997;Wheeler & McDonald, 1998). The integration of communication with traditional engineering courses can otibur within a single engineering design course, throughout the entire engineering curriculum, or within specific levels such as freshman or seniors (Alford & Rocheleau, 1998;Fentiman & Demel, 1995;Harms et al, 2001a;Tharp, 1998 1996).…”

Writing-across-the-curriculum in a linked course model for first-year students: an activity theory analysis

“…In each article, the authors advocate a different approach for teaching engineering students to be better writers including using variations of the following pedagogical strategies: writing tutors, a writing center, specific types of technical communication assignments, and a discipline specific student writing manual. Like the writmg-m-the-disciplines (WID) literature I discuss in the following section, the majority of articles addressing writing in engineering report programs designed for upper-level students (see for example, Alford and Gribb, 2000;* Alford and Rocheleau, 1998;* Ludlow and Schultz, 1994;Mahan, Jayasumana, Lile, and Palmquist, 2000;* Maharaj and Banta, 2000;Manuel-Dupont, 1996;McQueeney, 1999;Schultz and Ludlow, 1996;Sharp, Harb, and Terry, 1997;Sharp, Olds, Miller, and Dyrud, 1999;Thompson and Alford, 1997;Waitz and Barrett, 1997;Walker, 2000;Weiss and Scarola, 1998;Wheeler and McDonald, 2000).…”

Writing-across-the-curriculum in a linked course model for first-year students: an activity theory analysis

“…In each article, the authors advocate a different approach for teaching engineering students to be better writers including using variations of the following pedagogical strategies: writing tutors, a writing center, specific types of technical communication assignments, and a discipline specific student writing manual. Like the writmg-m-the-disciplines (WID) literature I discuss in the following section, the majority of articles addressing writing in engineering report programs designed for upper-level students (see for example, Alford and Gribb, 2000;* Alford and Rocheleau, 1998;* Ludlow and Schultz, 1994;Mahan, Jayasumana, Lile, and Palmquist, 2000;* Maharaj and Banta, 2000;Manuel-Dupont, 1996;McQueeney, 1999;Schultz and Ludlow, 1996;Sharp, Harb, and Terry, 1997;Sharp, Olds, Miller, and Dyrud, 1999;Thompson and Alford, 1997;Waitz and Barrett, 1997;Walker, 2000;Weiss and Scarola, 1998;Wheeler and McDonald, 2000).…”