Boosting computer-aided design pedagogy using interactive self-assessment graphical tools

Computer-aided design (CAD) tools are essential for any engineer and, thus, many researchers have focused on developing the most suitable method for acquiring CAD competences. In recent years, efforts have been devoted to designing new, innovative and helpful methodologies to improve the CAD pedagogy. The presented research aims at showing the advantages of integrating interactive self-assessment tools into CAD learning methodologies, such as problem-based learning (PBL). One hundred and ninety-one first-year Mechanical Engineering students participated in the research. They were evenly and randomly divided into two groups: a control group and an experimental group. Students belonging to the control group made use of PBL. The experimental group made use of PBL and a new interactive tool, called TrainCAD, that allows the self-assessment of 2D-CAD models designed in AutoCAD. The presented results show that experimental group students have considerably improved their academic performance and increased their motivation on the subject. Therefore, the combination of the two proposed approaches seems to be useful for helping students during the CAD learning process. On the other hand, gender was also a factor that has been analysed, to discern whether it influences the proposed academic learning process (based on the applied CAD pedagogy), concluding that there is no significant influence.