Project Objectives

The objectives of this project are (1) the collection of the daily learning activities for engineering undergraduates during the term time; (2) identification of the learning outcomes from the students’ perspectives; (3) alignment and refinement of the matrices for learning outcomes and activities in our documentations based on the inputs from teachers and students, (4) providing advices to students on effective time management, and (5) giving recommendations and references for teachers in designing new courses and drafting their curricula.

Description of process, outcomes or deliverable

We have been collecting the activity patterns of students, which includes the distribution of daily activities spend on various in-class, out-class, extra-curricular and other activities. These serve as good source of information on how students spend their time during term time. It has been shown that students are spending most of their time in attending lectures, doing assignments and reading. Their leisure time is limited and it is mainly spent on private activities rather than formal extra-curricular activities. In addition, we are also studying the usage patterns of students in the e-learning platform. Analysis has been performed on the usage patterns and the information of students, such as their year of study, type of programme, gender and academic achievement.

Evaluation

The activity pattern data provide us much information on the actual workload of students. So far the daily activity patterns from the students are generally normal and regular. We do not detect significant deviation from our expected learning activities from our formal curriculum or courses. But students are in general not active in participating in regular extra-curricular activities.

Dissemination, diffusion and impact

The information will be shared and disseminated with teachers in the Faculty of Engineering. Teachers will be suggested to provide more guidance to their Academic advisees regarding the time management. Faculty Curriculum Committee will monitor the course loading and revise the expected hours on the learning activities.