Improving Student Interaction with Chemical Engineering Learning Tools: Screencasts and Simulations

Interactive screencasts and interactive simulations were prepared and made openly available online to increase student interaction with chemical engineering teaching resources. Screencasts are short (typically less than 10 min) videos made using screen capture software and voice narration. Interactive screencasts pose conceptual questions that the viewer can answer by clicking on the answer within the video. Selecting an answer opens another video. If they selected the incorrect answer, the video indicates this and it may give them a hint or tell why the answer is incorrect. Then it allows them to select another answer, which opens another video. This continues until they choose the correct answer; that video then explains why the answer is correct. Similarly, interactive Mathematica simulations allow users to manually change variables and almost instantly see the effects on the system behavior. This encourages student interaction with part of an assignment, and can also be used in class where students are asked to predict system behavior. More than 400 chemical engineering simulations, prepared by a number of authors, are available on the Wolfram Demonstrations Project website. We have prepared about 25 of these simulations and are starting to prepare screencast that explain their use.