An Intuitive Approach to Teaching Concepts in Engineering to a General Audience

This paper focuses on a visual and intuitive approach to explaining concepts in engineering and technology. The method is based on establishing students’ intuition by providing visual relevance-based content before focusing on mathematical understanding. The goal is to help students develop a core understanding of the subject matter, leading to an easier transition to deeper mathematical analysis. As the objective is to teach difficult concepts with little to no use of math or physics, the content could help introduce a general audience to concepts that otherwise seem exclusive. It is part of a larger program at Florida Atlantic University that targets multiple topics and concepts in engineering, computer science, physics, and mathematics. The method was employed over the course of a semester for a class titled “Control Systems 1”. A small scale assessment was applied to gauge the students’ receptiveness to the techniques. Although the project is in the preliminary stages, the feedback has been positive. Currently, further efforts are being made to assess students throughout the course of the semester, comparing their overall success with their opinion of the techniques highlighted in the project.