Simulation-based Learning in Engineering Education: Performance and Transfer in Learning Project Management

Journal of Engineering Education, Oct 2006 by Davidovitch, L, Parush, A, Shtub, A

ABSTRACT

This paper reports empirical findings on the impact of keeping and reviewing learning history in a dynamic and interactive simulation environment of engineering education. The simulator for engineering project management had two learning history keeping modes: automatic (simulator-controlled) and manual (student-controlled), and a version with no history keeping. A group of industrial engineering students performed four simulation-runs divided into three identical simple scenarios (single project) and one complicated scenario (multi-project). The performances of participants running the simulation with the manual history mode were significantly better than users running the simulation with the automatic history mode. Moreover, the effects of using the history mechanism with the ability to undo further enhanced the learning process. The findings imply that students' decision when to record the history during their engineering training process can have a particularly strong enhancing effect on learning. In addition, the simulator as educational innovation improves students learning and performance. The practical implications of using simulators in the field of engineering learning are discussed.

Keywords: learning history, project management, simulation-based learning

I. INTRODUCTION

A. Learning Objectives

The discipline of engineering project management encompasses a wide range of applications, for example, construction, new product development, system development, and others. In order to improve engineering project management skills, new methodologies and tools are developed at an accelerated rate. However, this rapid development is not accompanied by similar progress in developing teaching and training tools. This paper reports empirical findings on using a new simulation tool that implements methodologies for teaching and training engineering project management.

The utilization of the new simulator took place in an engineering project planning and management course. This course is a 3.5-credit course for industrial engineering students covering fundamental aspects of engineering project management such as planning, executing, control, analysis, and integration. Since these issues are very important to the industry, many students take this course in their fourth year and the size of the class is usually large (about 100 students).

The course is based on learning various methodologies and techniques of project management: basic issues of project management through scheduling techniques, resources allocation, budget, control, risks, and the use of commercial software packages. The learning objectives of the course are to teach and train student to:

1. Manage the project's scope by defining the goals and work to be done in sufficient detail to facilitate understanding and corrective action, should the need arise.

2. Manage the human resources involved in the project.

3. Manage communications to see that the appropriate parties are informed and have sufficient information to keep the project on track.

4. Manage time by planning and meeting a schedule.

5. Manage quality so that the project's results are satisfactory.

6. Manage costs so that the project is performed at the minimum practical cost and within budget, if possible.

In order to prepare the students for a real project environment, there is a need to practice in the "real world" of project management. This was achieved using the Project Management Trainer (PMT) simulator, a user-friendly teaching and training tool, as part of the final laboratory assignment of the course. The learning objectives to manage time by planning and meeting a schedule and manage costs so that the project is performed at the minimum practical cost and within budget, if possible, are met by the simulator. In order to meet these objectives, the simulator design contains a library of dynamic integrated case studies and a set of project management models. The database contains the scenario data which include each activity status, resources and budget status, and scheduling. The database supports the ability to save the simulation status at different points in time, i.e., keep the history of the learning process, as well as perform undo (i.e., return to a previous time point). The saved and undo parameters include: history file name, user name, user ID, project name, current total duration, current cash, current run time. In addition, the following is saved for each activity: activity status, activity mode, activity start time, budget, and resources status. The simulator is integrated with a commercial project management software tool (Microsoft Project�) which is used in many organizations.

This paper reports empirical findings on the impact of training with the PMT, a dynamic and interactive simulation environment, and in particular, the impact of keeping and reviewing the history of learning with the simulator. The empirical findings are based on analyzing the performances of the engineering students using the simulator as part of their project management education.