Investigating the Impact of Model Eliciting Activities on Development of Critical Thinking

This paper presents a portion of a study on how model eliciting activities (MEAs) impact critical thinking development in first year engineering. Model eliciting activities (MEAs) are realistic problems used in the classroom that require learners to document not only their solution to the problems, but also their processes for solving them. Studies have shown MEAs to be valuable in helping students to develop conceptual understanding, knowledge transfer , and generalizable problem-- ‐ solving skills. This study is investigating the impact of the MEA- integrated course on students’ development of critical thinking skills. Ultimately, the team aims to determine whether the MEA-integrated course facilitates students’ critical thinking. During the fall semester of the 2012/2013 academic year three instruments will be used to evaluate the critical thinking skills (CTS) of first year engineering students. These instruments will be used as both a pre-- ‐ and post-- ‐ test in order to benchmark CTS of the incoming first year students, and determine the effectiveness of MEA instruction on developing student critical thinking ability. These instruments are the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Cornell Z), the International Critical Thinking Essay Test (ICTET) and the Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA). This paper will present the preliminary findings from analysis of the MEA results and pre and post tests from the study.