Adventures in Paragraph Writing: The Development and Refinement of Scalable and Effective Writing Exercises for Large-enrollment Engineering Courses

The ability to communicate effectively is a highly desirable attribute for today’s graduating engineers. Additionally, the inclusion of communication components in technical courses has been shown to enhance learning of technical content and can be leveraged to satisfy nontechnical learning outcomes. However, the incorporation of such components in undergraduate engineering curricula remains challenging due to obstacles such as resource limitations, credit hour constraints, and low faculty and student motivation. This paper reports preliminary results from our ongoing efforts to create effective, transferrable, and low-overhead approaches to implementing paragraph writing exercises in large engineering courses typically devoid of communication elements. We begin by reviewing relevant literature discussing strategies for incorporating writing in a variety of course types, with particular emphasis on shorter, integrated assignments. We then turn to the development and implementation of paragraph writing exercises in a large civil engineering undergraduate fluid mechanics course (117 students; approximately 15 assignments). A primary focus of this first application and pilot study centered on two key components that must be refined in order for the exercise to be effective and transferrable: (1) the creation and selection of high quality writing prompts, and (2) assessment of student work in light of typical manpower and expertise limitations associated with large classes. Analysis of student paragraphs highlights the importance of the writing prompts in the success of the exercise, indicating that specific word choice, question focus, and supplemental instruction greatly affected the level of writing students submitted. While minimal marking and holistic rubric assessment methods proved effective from a grading resource standpoint, students were frustrated by the lack of feedback associated with these techniques and uncomfortable with the holistic grading approach. Data from student surveys point to the importance of giving meaningful feedback to students and providing them with opportunities to revise their written submissions. The implementation of paragraph writing into a large enrollment engineering course successfully increased the amount of writing students were doing with relatively little overhead needed by the instructor and students. Unresolved difficulties and suggested improvements are also discussed.