Work-in-Progress: Development of the Discipline 'Innovations in Engineering Pedagogy' as Part of an Advanced Professional Training for Educators of Engineering Schools in Higher Education Institutions

摘要

Engineering workforce fuels high-pace technology developments in all aspects of human life. A quality of engineering education today is essential to build engineers for tomorrow. This raises standards for pedagogical training for professors and other staff of engineering educational institutions. The framework of ERASMUS + project "EngineeriNg educaTors pEdagogical tRaining" ("ENTER") provides a venue for partnership between universities to develop and enhance curriculum. This article provides results of collaboration of KNRTU with thirteen universities from Europe, Kazakhstan and Russia in an effort to develop a Multi-Level Modular Curricula "Innovative Pedagogy for Engineering HEIs' Educators" (iPET) for the advanced professional training of the "educator of the future". In this work, creativity is identified as a key component of professional competence of an educator. As such, main goal of the discipline is to boost creativity of educator, to practice conventional and contemporary innovative pedagogical techniques and to build confidence to implement them in professional activity. Understanding of motivation, operational conditions, creative thinking, ability to reflect and their interconnections is necessary for successful implementation of the course. Analysis of innovative pedagogical technologies was also conducted as part of this work. It was established that the most promising are mind-maps, concept maps of literature review, Thesaurus description of terminological systems, so called Thesaurus maps. Research concluded, that the best results are expected when training is continuous, but administered in sessions, alternated with periods of practicing in a workplace. This allows educators and students to adapt to new techniques and master fewer of them at a time. This article summarizes methods, tools and organizational forms that are recommended for use in the discipline "Innovations in Engineering Pedagogy".