Teaching Soft Skills in Engineering Education: An European Perspective

Caeiro-Rodríguez, Manuel; Manso-Vázquez, Mario; Mikic-Fonte, Fernando A.; Llamas-Nistal, Martín; Fernández‐Iglesias, Manuel J.; Tsalapatas, Hariklia; Heidmann, Olivier; Carvalho, Carlos Vaz de; Jesmin, Triinu; Terasmaa, Jaanus; Sørensen, Lene Tolstrup

doi:10.1109/access.2021.3059516

Cited by 69 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…These educational videos often focus on the creation of interest and show examples of practical applications, which also promote students' engagement and develop their critical thinking ability [13]. Such characteristics also make them suitable for the teaching of soft skills in engineering education [14], using them as key format in gamification strategies, as well as supportive resources in learning environment and content delivery in MOOC.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing Users’ Perception on the Current and Potential Educational Value of an Electrical Engineering YouTube Channel

et al. 2022

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Full comprehension of abstract concepts present in engineering education has been usually considered challenging. Engaging multimedia resources have proven to be useful pedagogical aids to increase students' motivation. In fact, already existing dissemination videos might be suitable to fulfill this objective. This research aims to contribute assessing video implications in the enhancement of engineering education quality, through the evaluation of the current pedagogical use of a specific electrical engineering YouTube channel. To meet this objective, we characterize the use of such channel through a quantitative methodology based on a 5-point Likert scale survey (Cronbach's alpha=0.76). Sample data was collected from 912 respondents, who assessed the channel content and format adequacy, users' preferences, and their perceptions on video integration in educational contexts. Results show (3.98 over 5) that there is currently a far-reaching educational use of the channel, and a general perception that its contents and audiovisual format are adequate for such purpose. Most users agree (4.74 over 5) that this kind of pedagogical resource could enhance education quality. As limitations, an underrepresentation of teachers in the sample could be highlighted, though student community is well represented. Overall findings suggest that the format and cognitive load in scientific dissemination YouTube channels might be perceived as suitable for pedagogical use, as means to improve education experience. This complementary use unveils the need to implement technology integration models to facilitate their pedagogical insertion, which will be addressed as future works along with more evaluations of similar dissemination channels.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing Users’ Perception on the Current and Potential Educational Value of an Electrical Engineering YouTube Channel

et al. 2022

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“…As there have been only a few studies directly or indirectly dealing with correlations among these three variables, it is difficult to directly compare them with the current study. However, based on prior studies [28,29,31,32,34,35], we can predict that the higher a student's soft skills, the more positive the attitudes toward integration. Also, the higher one's empathy, the more positive the attitudes toward integration.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…Given the emerging global consensus on the importance of education curricula imparting 21st century capabilities, there is a growing interest in the development of soft skills as they relate to capabilities to flexibly cope with rapidly changing times and social structures, and engineering education has been representative for the past two decades in this regard [27][28][29][30][31]. In fact, nowadays, soft skills are considered to be as important to engineering and architectural work as technical knowledge or hard skills [48].…”

Section: Soft Skills In Engineering Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Interestingly, [27], analyzing the correlation of personality with project management, found engineering students to be lower in soft skills and women students to be significantly higher in sensitivity to others, empathy, and emotion contagion. Although soft skills, which are cross-disciplinary and independent of job or industry, generally cannot be learned passively or even actively [28], and some of them, furthermore, are even unlearnable through conventional teaching [31], they can at least be improved [29]. Taken together, soft skills enable people to cope with the challenges of professional and everyday life.…”

Section: Soft Skills In Engineering Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effects of Engineering Students’ Soft Skills and Empathy on Their Attitudes toward Curricula Integration

Hwang

2022

Education Sciences

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Recently, various integrated education curricula for STEM curricula have been provided. This research sought to investigate the effects of engineering students’ soft skills and empathy on their attitudes toward curricula integration (hereafter, attitudes toward integration). First, students’ attitudinal differences respecting integration, soft skills and empathy were examined. Second, the relationships among attitudes toward integration, soft skills and empathy were identified in terms of various sub-factors of those three variables. Third, the effects of soft skills and empathy on attitudes toward integration, as perceived by men and women engineering students, were explored. A total of 302 engineering students from three universities in Korea responded to a survey based on a three-variable scale. Analysis of the data found that: firstly, men scored higher in most of the sub-factors of two variables, namely attitudes toward integration and soft skills; women scored higher in most of the sub-factors of one variable, empathy; and that these gender differences were statistically significant. Secondly, a positive correlation among attitudes toward integration, soft skills and empathy was identified. Thirdly, it was determined that attitudes toward integration were affected significantly by soft skills and empathy. The practical implications of these findings for engineering education are discussed herein, with particular attention devoted to the issue of the cultivation of engineering students’ soft skills, empathy, and attitudes toward integration.

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“…This research highlighted entrepreneurship, innovation, communication, teamwork and lifelong learning competencies [13], [14]. Analyzing the scientific literature, different ways of learning transversal competencies are described, for example, problem-based learning, project-based learning, games, simulations, discussions [16], [17], [18], [2].…”

Section: Environment Technology Resources Rezekne Latvia Proceedings Of the 13 Th International Scientific And Practical Conference Volummentioning

confidence: 99%

Transversal Competencies for Digital Readiness and Development of Human Capital in Engineering Education

Abuže

Lubkina

2021

ETR

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The research is carried out within the framework of Rezekne Academy of Technology, Latvia in cooperation with West Ukrainian National University, Ukraine LV – UA project “Gender aspects of digital readiness and development of human capital in regions” Nr.LV-UA/ 2018/3.Nowadays, educational institutions have to adapt to the new situation, make changes that would promote the transformation of the study process, promote the development of digital readiness and human capital.The aim of the research is to study the need for transversal competencies, innovation, entrepreneurship and development of digital readiness and human capital in engineering studies. The monographic and descriptive method has been applied for studying scientific literature and modeling method for a professional development plan.

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Teaching Soft Skills in Engineering Education: An European Perspective

Cited by 69 publications

References 28 publications

Assessing Users’ Perception on the Current and Potential Educational Value of an Electrical Engineering YouTube Channel

Assessing Users’ Perception on the Current and Potential Educational Value of an Electrical Engineering YouTube Channel

Effects of Engineering Students’ Soft Skills and Empathy on Their Attitudes toward Curricula Integration

Transversal Competencies for Digital Readiness and Development of Human Capital in Engineering Education

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