Abstract:

What occurs when a software engineering course disrupts teaching modes traditionally found in computer science courses? How can humanities, community-engaged learning, just-in-time teaching, and qualitative teaching methods support enhanced learning goals for activating software engineering skills with real-world applications?

In the Fall term of 2019, a community-engaged learning process was implemented within the course objectives for CIS3750 Systems Analysis and Design in Applications, a required 3rd year software engineering course for all Bachelor of Computing Students at the University of Guelph, Canada.

In this presentation, we will describe how this traditional software engineering course has been updated to support a curricular team-based work-integrated learning environment that is grounded in community-engagement. In particular, we will discuss how the course was redesigned to include not only traditional/typical software engineering learning outcomes (e.g. develop software requirements that are specific, measurable, and categorized), but also to include a set of specific and measurable foundational skills learning outcomes (e.g. recognize discipline specific biases that might impact our ability to solve a problem). To support the mastery of the updated learning outcomes, we will describe how students from the Fall 2019 cohort were tasked to build a website-integrated mobile application for the local public health unit (Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health) with the aim of engaging citizens to report on tick bites and evaluate possible Lyme disease exposure. In particular, students were guided through various activities to support both types of learning outcomes, including team building and development, interactive lab demonstrations and client evaluation and feedback, and reflective exercises.

To evaluate the student learning experience, an ethnographic researcher used an observational protocol to track student and teacher interactions marking the presence of metacognitive tasks within the course content. Activities observed integrated the development of project management and client communication skills in conjunction with program development and coding skills. Findings suggest that interpersonal communication supported expanded understanding of the role of software engineering within social contexts. The result is a socially dynamic and interactive learning process with exciting implications for animating scientific learning environments. This project demonstrates possibilities for integrating science and humanities learning approaches towards effective knowledge acquisition and mobilization.

Keywords:

Interdisciplinary studies, experiential learning, community-engaged learning, just-in-time teaching.