Cooperative learning at Telemark State University : the student's verdict

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3rd East-I'Vest Con.gress on Engineering Education Gdynia, Poland, 15-20 September1996

@1996USICEE

Co-operative learning a.t Telelnark State University - th~ students' verdict

T. Clausen

The Engineering College of Hogskolen i Telemark) Porsgrunn Norwa,y

Lead Paper

ABSTRACT: The Engineering College of HøgskoleniTelemark has practiced cooperalive leamingsince1982. As seen from the college, this way ofadministeringthe students' work appears powerful. After briefl}" having described the "Telemark Model", the paper concludesbyreportingpositive academic feedback fromtheU.S.A.in addition topresent thesludents' opinion about thiswayofcOl\ductingcoopel'utive learning.

It has beenfoundthat students at large find projr.ct workingroups timeconsuming but rewarding. Their positiveattitudeto- wards cooperative leaming becomes morec1earlypronounced as theyadvancefrom freshmen toseniorsand Graduatcs. The latters, who are seing the whole proeess retrospectiveJy, are mported to tind the proeess of a 3-year's cooperative leaming program usefullo their daily work.

THE TELEMARK MODEL

INTRODUCTION

Engineering education hasheenunder pressure,allenst in the Western world for the last 25 years.Thepre.ssure has comefrom industry,from public utilitycompanies, from politicians, and not at least, from within the univer"

sities and colleges themselves. The root for this pressure waslikelyto be theslructuralchanges observed in the

"industrial world^ttas new countries and regions started to takeoverimportant fields of production. Thiscontinuing proeess may partly have lend to the present situation, where engineersbyhuntlreds of tbousunds[11have been laid off.

Atthe. presentEngineeringCollege of HøgskoleniTele- mark, or Telemark State University, thesechallenges have been taken seriously since 1976, when the first experiments with cooperativeleamingtook place. Since 1982 a system of cooperativeleaminghas been applied toall c/asses. In Norway, this wayof organizing the

student's

work, wassoonto be known as the"Telemark Madel".Cooperativeteamingis

often

referred to also as I'Project Oriented Studies"or"Problem-BasedLeaminglI,

PBL.

This paper will~rieflydescribe the Telemark Model as

seen

from the college with respect to educational activities and administration.Finally,the paper reports student

and

evengraduate reactionsto this model andcompares these to some ideal goals which can he set for cooperative leuming programs.

J2,9

The Telemark

model

is aslightly modifiedversionofthe pedagogic approach used atthe Universityof Ålborg, Denmark.

Engineering education at HøgskoleniTelemark lasts for 3years,each year is divided into 2 semesters, The semesters are numbereclfrom1 to 6,wherethe 6^IJtsemes- ter is the semester ofgraduation.

The TelemarkModeI

is

characterizedbytitegroupI the project, the adviser, the dO"umellttltioll, and theeva111- ntion.

L TheGroup.Consistsnormallyof 4-7 students but spe- cial arrangements may be made on demand. The group is expeoted to constitute themselves. define standards for group behavior,exert self justiee etc.

Thegroup isofficiallyorganized

for

the project orien-

~artofthe studies. But manygroupmembers are cooperating

aJso in

coursestaught

in

traditional

ways

2. ThePraject. There aredifferenttypes of projcclCi:

a) First Semester's Project should have a broad scope, dealing with general problems of interest to society at large -typicallywith an environ- mental emphasis.

IdeaUy,

this project is suppo- sed to introduee the student to a scientifical way of thinking, working and writing. Thetopies maybechosenbythe group from alistset up bytheteacher

(2)

Xlsemesters:Technicalprojects, aften in Illionwitb industryorpublic utiJity com- The problem is usually assignedbythe

~mcslef"sproject (main project, 60%of loateror more):

A

technical project given tcmcheror others

.I'ojccts: The group members are required pr<~ectreport orallyto anaudience.

. Etlch

group

is assigned one adviser

and rht.~scare normaUy members of the

ordi-

lowewer,some extemal project partners

\dth~irinlerest in cJoser cooperation hUllbeen worked out to assist advisers during the process

marioIl. The group's activities and pro- 1mdocumentedbya"projectfile" conlai- te.l a "process description" where the uutingtheit progress, and the formal re-

"horeis a pass/fail system. Only thefinal uJc<.l) with individual grades for each

::OURSE CONTENT

tidelis, depending on the engineering de-

'l

nilocllting

25-30

% of

the total organi- ieetwork. The rest of the weekly. sche- tioncd above, filled with "traditional ac-

<:ontent of the project work can only IlnoLlcontrolledbytheteacher, hewiH ) role thanusual toprovidethe "useful"

ntudcnts. lnsteud: Cooperative partners

~t,will huve(and use) the opportunity to logedirectly throughstudentwork. Ex-

ving thut

teachers are indeed leaming

flttl'rcports and often include

such

ma-

n c1nssroom work.

I~~(:tof the Telemark model is the oppor- iz.."rion~limitedby thenarrow frarnes un..'~pl'Ogram.Samegraduatesare re-

;'l'1lhif(~d

just

because

of

the topiethey

ht,ir n1ain project in

thefinal semester.

d IllteJ,

ihls

iH not "the generalrule".

:U"('ATIONAL METHOIDS

l'hn~,h(t"11H~krn:d

to

lUi

"trrtditionnl Ste..

... Ir"l\lf'dI,wdit'~. abov~

ull

^m('HUad,{mgl:~

The change is fundamental since the objectives of pro- jectorientedstudiesare something more thanjustacurri- culum replaeement: While a "traditional" program nor·

maUyemphasises certain selected fields of specifie knowledge, project oriented studies are trying to realise objec- lives like [2]

1. leaeh the fundamentals

2. help the students bow toteam,and

3. give the students some training in salving problems Done successfully,projectoriented studies should have the ideal objective of helping the students leam to know themselves, making themfitfor working

in

a constantly

changing

world.

CImANGE OF THE TEACHER R()lLE

The ideal r6le of the teacher serving as an adviser,may be formulated like this [3]:

Thereal challe"ge in college teaching is not covering the malerialjor the studellls, il 's ullcovering the male- rialwirhthe students

Consequently, the adviser needs neither be the expert of the lopie chosen bythe group nor in command of the group proeess. He should instead be the insightful indi- reetleaderletting things happen.

This changemaybe describecl as fundamental. Maybe the "change of thetea~her"will be the key element in re- structuringeng~neeringeducation for tomorrow's

neoos?

C~ICULUM

CHANGE

The partial shift of responsibility from the teaeher to stude~tgroupswilJlead to the growth of "new"curricula containing severaJ elements necessary to cope with the realities in the world of today.

The "new" curriculum roay includetallgibleas weU as illlangiblefeatures(4]:

l) Among thetangibleaspects are training in prac- tica1 leadersbip, applied to handling and follow- ing up formal meetings, the preparation ånd im- plementationof oral presentations, basictechni- ca1 writing including style, granunar, speIling etc. And - of course - training in finding and appJying 'appropriate technical solutions even in fields which are not being laught at the college 2) Same intangible parts ofthe "new" curriculum inc1ude experience with a variety of group psy- chology proeesses (also handling immigrants with often different cultural hackgrounds), devo..

lopment of personal

nttributes as creativity, so··

cial adjustment;

responsihility,

flexihility, initi··

ative, cournge nnd

perSt~rveranco

(3)

ADMINISTRATIVE CHANGES Respondents

As mentioned earlier, only 25 - 30 %of the total~

duled time is allocated for the cooperative leaming program. But even this apparently modest change of program means some fundamental changes to the daily routines of the college.

l) The advisers should be pulled together to agreeon certain basic principles underly~ngthe idea of co·

operative leaming and how to put these into work

2)

Students mustbe

arranged

in groups as weU as elasses

The results are based on -thecollectio~of questionnaire forms from

- 62 entering freshmen - 36 sophomores - 48seniors,and 17 graduates

The

questions

which

were asked

the

graduates deviated a liule from those addressed to the students, who were

all asked

identical

questions.

3) The college must have plenty of small rooms or at leastlargetables tobeusedbythe grot,tps. In addition to ordinary c1assrooms, largerplenaryrooms forlarge

composite

groupsarenecessary~

4) The advisers (teachers) should ideaIJy have offices largeenough to handle sudden meetings with student groups

These figures tell that nearly 50%of the total number of students have responded. Provided clearly formulated questions,the studentresponseshould giveimportant sig- nals back to the college. 17 graduates does not seem very much but the)t response could givc the

college

same feedbackilldicaliofls,at lenst.

1.

Attitude towards the

Telemark

Model

2. Should the Telemark Modcl

he

changed?

The respondents were asked how they felt aboul cooperative leaminglattheirpresemstage of development:

The results appearconsi~tent, exc~pt for the freshmen.

This

may

bedue to lhis group's lnck of experience with the cooperative program: The survey toak place less than 2monthsafter thcirentranee tothecollege.

12

O 2 O Negative

44

O O O ];)on'lknow

More liberty, better

supervision

More time, bettersupervisjon More time, bettersupervisåon More time, better supervisjon Commenls fromthe nyes" group

44

100

98

100 Positive Figuresin % Category

Figuresin

%

Category No Yes Freshman Sophamare Senior Grnduate

Freshmen 54 46 Sophomore53 47 Senior 40 60 Graduate O 100 However, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology

(SDSM&T),

Rapid City,receiving

70·80

Telemark

gra-

duatesfor MSc-studies since 1990, isreportingexcellent results.Th~grudereportsent the author from the Electri- cal Engineering Department after the Fall Semester of 1994

may

be use:d as an example:

5) A "satisfactory" numberof PC's, printers, binding

machines, telephone lines (with an

"approprinle'i buuget) etc. are required for student use

ACADEMIC RESULTS

6) A large amountofjobs/problems musl befoundwit- hin and outside the college to be used as project thernesbythegroups

50fnr, no researchhas beencarried,out

to

document the professional resuIts of grauuates from the Engineering Collegeof Høgskoleni Telemark.

The 8 entering transfer students from Telemark achieved anaverage gradepointratio of 3.01ofthe maximum of 4.00. Later, after having adjusted to the American system,the grades normally raise substantially.

This tap performanee is reported to have been discussed bythe SDSM&T faculty, and credit has to a great extent been given to the Telemark Model's development of the tallg'ible and ima"giblecurriculum elemellts mentjoned above.

STUDENTS' VERDICT

No extensive

research50far has taken

place

to evaluate the students'

attitude

towardstheTelemark Madel. The numhers

and

figure..~used

here are therefore

taken from a studentreport [5] based on a survey during the Fall StHn<'~!lt<~r

1990, superviscd by

the author.

Itcanbe

seen.

that the respqndents get more aware as they proceed through the system, as they are generalJy becomingmore criticaI.

Evenifthey as a group tend to be satisfied with theMo- del, they are critical to theie supervisers all the

way

through.Morespecificly, many c1aim that

their

supervi- ser do not cooperate weU with other supervisers(!) Theydo aU agree that the schoolseems to allocate too

short time for

for

the project

work.

(4)

The respondents were asked hown:!uchtime they thoughl theyputintoproject work each week:

5.

nRihvC)IOUi1n~rr

JnPIPU....d

wtud

you

B(~rUtHJ\

hy

~OOP(;' rathvc lcanlillln inyoun'

dllHy

WOr&(f!

Thisquestion was asked the graduates, who responded:

1)

The

questionnaire

was

completed during the

Fall

semester of the Senior

year.

The real chalJenge, the MainPro- ject of 6weekly hours takes place in the 6^1hand final semester.

Figures in hours per week Category Scheduled Actually

Sophomore 2 10

Senior 2¹¹ 12

Comments Theactualload differsbelW.depts.

Figures in% Ves No

71 29

Taken into account that 35

%

of this group of (only) 17 were hired inlo posilionsoutside their major field ofin- terst, the result is interesting asit also canbedete(:ted an indication of adaptabiliry to unexpected conditions.

The

enteringfreshmen were not asked this question because they badJUSIenlered the college, see comments to questionl, ^ItAttitucle..tiabove. CoHecting the graduates view onwhaltheymight haverhoughrtheyremembered from some years aga, was considered of Iiule value and

omiued. .

The table apparentJy shows students being pressed to work 5 to 6 times more than scheduled time. However, at theengineering college it is assumed that the weekly assigned student work shouldamounlto 50-60 hours. As the classroom and laboratorywork is sheduledloonly 20 hours,

it

is expected lhat each student should put alleast 5-6 weekly hours into every 2 hours' project.

Maybe theyare puuing the extra wark into their projects because they are feeling comfortable with the leaming process?

4. DoYOlllthinlk the Telemark l\!odel is a better pre- paratton for future emplo)'ment (han an ordinary

engineering

program?

Figures in~

eategoa Yes No Comments from the"yes" groups Freshman 95 5 Self confidence, experience in Sophomore 100 Ohand~inginformationsand meet- Senior 83 11 ings

Graduate - Onappropriate)

Evenif question 2 uncovered some sceptical comments on the supervisers, the studentss~emto have faith in the Telemarkway of handling cooperative leaming program with respect toth~irpost-graduationperformance.

The respondents answering "no" lend to agree that:

1)Project work istoa timeconsuming

2) The amount of project work is unevenly imposedøby the different engineering departments: The burden is considered most heavybythe chemical and electronics students. The electrical power students represent the other edge

3) Project work displaces what the students consider to be the -real curriculum" bt:yond acceptable limits

332

The graduates listed these ^Itnew curriculum" items as most important to theirjobs:

- writing reports - cooperation - writing(in general)

research, since research work is aften organized as projects

- presentations

6. Did you get your first joh because ofYOU.lIl"experi- encewith PlI'ojCd work in groups?

This question was llsked the gradulltes, who~esponded:

Figuresin%

Yes No Don't know

10 45 4S

One may ask:Jfcooperative leaming is • which has been demonstrated here - such excelJent way of educating young people, why' don't the colJege do a better jobin seilingils gratluatesto the labor marked?

CONClLUSION

It has been shown that students at large tend to have faith in and are positive to the Telemark Model of cooperative leaming. Even though they find the project work timeconsuming they apparently tind themselves personally devel·

.oping. too. On the olher side, there is a fear of the time spent on project work is paid by the sacrifice ofthe

"hard knowledge" laught in ordinary courses.

In short:

l) Student view on the benetits of cooperative leaming lends to coincide with the "tangible and intangible curriculum elements" listedearJn,erin this paper 2) The response from the SDSM&T seems to contradiet

their fear of the negativp consequences of sacrificing some traditional curricula to the advantage of cooperative wark in groups, and, not without irony, 3) the Engineering College of Høgskoleni Telemark

should improve their own cooperative routines befare the students - eventuaJly - become satisfied

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I. IEEE Speetmm: Arth'/(rr.\', nr,,;"mllt;! 1990, A\AUU!&l 1993 and November1994

2. Hagler. M.,NEEDHA CJwir's Messuge,Newsletter of the IEEE Educalion Society and i\SEE Electrical Engineering Divisjon, Spring 1994

3. Smith, K.A. supported

by

Johnson, D. and Johnson

R.

tNotes on CooperQt;o1l i1l1he College ClassroonJ, Fall 1994

4. Clausen, T., The Curriculum is Dead • Lang Live

the Curriculum.Proc. Fourth World COIlf. on Engin- eeringEducarioll. St. Pau], USA, 82-84 (l99S) 5. A Telemark student group report, Prosjektrettet

undervisning, Porsgrunn, Notway (1990)