Teaching Advanced Vehicle Dynamics Using a Project Based Learning (PBL) Approach.

AbstractThis paper presents an interesting teaching experiment carried out at Arizona State University (ASU). The author offered a new course in computational/analytical vehicle dynamics to senior undergraduate students, graduate students, and practicing engineers. As the author initially explored the possibility of incorporating a PBL approach in this course, the following question arose: Can a PBL approach be successfully implemented in a diverse classroom where the individual students may have different skill sets and academic expectations? This paper reports the efforts to find answers to this important question via a practical experiment. The author designed and offered a PBL course to a diverse class of students and measured the outcomes via qualitative and quantitative assessment and triangulation approach.The objective of this PBL course was to present vehicle dynamics theory with practical applications using a commercial dynamics simulation software (MSCADAMS). The class composition for this course was quite diverse. Some students had more than 20 years of industrial experience and some undergraduate students had little or no industrial experience. In order to help students meet their learning goals, the author (instructor) adopted an integrated PBL approach. The author tuned PBL methodology for a diverse classroom and helped students meet their educational goals.In the PBL approach used here, the students were presented with theory concepts and along with in-class tutorials, where the instructor discussed each step in detail. Students were then assigned home-works that strengthened the understanding of the concepts, and finally, were asked to work on a real life project that forced them to 'think outside the box'. The emphasis during the initial stages of the learning process was to make students aware of the capabilities and limitations of software used to solve vehicle dynamics problems. This led to the development of an 'engineering-sense,' or an ability to make sense of the results obtained using the software.In this paper, we review this 'understand- crawl-walk-run' PBL approach adopted for this course and present some of the challenges faced by the author. We evaluate this PBL pedagogy, qualitatively and quantitatively and discuss the results of student survey, assessment, student learning objectives and course evaluations. We also present evidence that the PBL is an effective approach for teaching a diverse class where students have different backgrounds, age, experience, and academic expectations.Introduction:In the fall of 2008, the graduate students and practicing engineers requested the author, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Engineering Technology (ET) to offer a new course in computational vehicle dynamics that would allow them to understand vehicle dynamics from a multi-body analytical dynamics point of view and use a commercial dynamics software (MSC-ADAMS) to solve practical vehicle dynamics problems (MSC Website, 2011). It is noted that MSC is the software company that has developed the multi-body dynamics simulation software ADAMS and various modules like ADAMS-View, ADAMS-Car, etc. This course was offered as a graduate/senior undergraduate course and had a unique class composition. Forty percent of the students had 10 years or more of industrial experience, 20 percent of the students had 20 years or more of industrial experience, 30 percent of the graduate students had less than two years of experience, and 10percent of the senior undergraduate students were interested in pursuing careers in automotive engineering.Even though the project-based teaching is a very popular approach in STEM education, this approach needs to be implemented slightly differently when the student population ranges from senior executives with 20 years or more of experience to senior undergraduate students with little to no practical experience (Ramsden, 2002; Blumenfeld, 1991; DeFillippi, 2001; Hmelo- Silver, 2004). …