Needs Assessment for Engineering Design Process Skill Development of Upper Primary Students

Abstract

            This research project aims for 3 goals, namely: (1) to analyze the needs for improving the engineering design process of students; (2) to analyze the reasons that affect the engineering design process of students; and (3) to study the guideline for improving the engineering design process of students. The instruments used for this research project were an examination form for assessing the scientific process skills, interviewing, and group discussion. The research project was divided into
3 phases, namely, the 1^st phase: identifying the needs; the 2^nd phase, analyzing the needs to find the underlying reasons; and the 3^rd phase: determining the guideline for solving such the issue. The result can be summarized, as follows. (1) The result of identifying the needs for improving the engineering design process of students in the secondary education program, using an examination form for assessing the 8 scientific process skills that are related to the engineering design process. The examination form contains 28 items. The author gathered the data from the examination and then prioritized the needs by using the PNI_Modified formula. The result revealed that the top 3 most necessary scientific process skills of students that should be urgently improved were: (1) the calculation skill, (2) the observation skill, and (3) the data organizing and communication skill, respectively. (2) The result of analyzing the needs to find the underlying reasons revealed the following reasons: students lacked the fundamental knowledge, understanding, and skills; the teachers’ failure to use more diversified media for teaching such skills; and the students’ lack of interest in studying. Moreover, though teachers employed several, interesting media in their teaching, students still lacked the samples of data presentation. The result of determining the guideline for solving the issue revealed teachers should employ a more diversified media in their teaching, especially those tangible learning materials that allow students to continuously improve and practice their fundamental skills, stimulate and attract students’ attention to studying, teach students to work as a team, and train student to design an interesting presentation so they will be able to communicate the message they wish to convey to other people.