Incorporating Experiential Learning in Engineering Courses

In recent years, "experiential learning" as a method of delivering course material has become more recognized in university education. This article is a report on a project conducted in the School of Engineering Science at Simon Fraser University that incorporates experiential learning in a lower division course. The course is a first-year, common core course in logic circuits. At the time that this project was implemented, the course did not have any lab components attached to it; therefore, incorporating experiential learning into the course was even more challenging. In this article, an example of an assignment given to students that incorporates experiential learning is presented, and the results of students' feedback on this method of learning compared to the conventional method are summarized. A similar approach can be applied to other subjects in engineering, even without requiring a laboratory component in the course. This article also provides example applications for analog and digital communication courses.