Figure 1

The International Journal of Engineering Education published our paper (“A Time Series Analysis Method for Assessing Engineering Design Processes Using a CAD Tool“) on learning analytics and educational data mining for assessing student performance in complex engineering design projects. I believe this is the first time learning analytics was applied to the study of engineering design — an extremely complicated process that is very difficult to assess using traditional methodologies because of its open-ended and practical nature.

Figure 2

This paper proposes a novel computational approach based on time series analysis to assess engineering design processes using our Energy3D CAD tool. To collect research data without disrupting a design learning process, design actions and artifacts are continuously logged as time series by the CAD tool behind the scenes, while students are working on an engineering design project such as a solar urban design challenge. These “atomically” fine-grained data can be used to reconstruct, visualize, and analyze the entire design process of a student with extremely high resolution. Results of a pilot study in a high school engineering class suggest that these data can be used to measure the level of student engagement, reveal the gender differences in design behaviors, and distinguish the iterative (Figure 1) and non-iterative (Figure 2) cycles in a design process.

From the perspective of engineering education, this paper contributes to the emerging fields of educational data mining and learning analytics that aim to expand evidence approaches for learning in a digital world. We are working on a series of papers to advance this research direction and expect to help with the “landscaping” of  those fields.