Hands-on in the Online Classroom: Transitioning a Hands-on Pedagogy to a Virtual Format

During the coronavirus outbreak in spring 2020, many universities across the United States chose to transition to online instruction for a significant portion of the semester. While the transition to online learning for traditional classes can be straightforward, determining how to best implement hands-on pedagogies in an online environment is substantially more challenging; however, these pedagogies can still be valuable for improving student conceptual understanding and motivation. Our team has previously developed a number of Low-Cost Desktop Learning Modules (LC-DLMs) for fluid mechanics and heat transfer courses which are typically utilized by small groups of students in a classroom setting. Students perform qualitative experiments, analyze data, and discuss conceptual items in an interactive format. This presentation will explore our efforts to transition this pedagogy to a virtual format. We created a detailed demonstration video showing data collection for each module, provided short instructional videos covering concepts defined in learning objectives, and transitioned worksheet materials to a format supported by online learning management systems. Results from pre- and post-implementation conceptual assessments and motivational surveys will be presented for virtual implementations at several universities for a hydraulic loss and double pipe heat exchanger LC-DLM. These results will be compared to conceptual and motivational data collected during traditional hands-on implementations of the same modules in fall 2019. We hypothesize that these results will show nearly equivalent effectiveness of virtual hands-on pedagogy implementations and we will highlight any significant differences in conceptual understanding or motivation compared to hands-on implementations. We also hypothesize that this early work will allow us to develop refined virtual implementations of hands-on pedagogies which will be broadly useful at resource-limited universities or in traditionally online-based programs in the future.