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Problem-Based Learning Applied to Electrical Engineering

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 Problem-Based Learning Applied to Electrical Engineering
E. Helerea, A. MaŃoi, I. Oltean, A. Munteanu
Transilvania University of Braşov/ Electrical Engineering Department, Braşov, Romania

Index Terms: Electrical engineering education, Problem based learning, Designing.

1. Introduction

The current debates with respect to the role of the education, of the schools and of the universities within
contemporary society, focused on the targets of the education and on their relation with the human being,
with society and culture, comprise questions of importance, such as:
- Which are the competencies of priority?
- What does education stand for: instruction, socialization, knowledge transmission?
- How will education look like in the perspective of the automation, of the globalisation and of the
internalization of society?
- Which is the role of the universities and of the university education?
The answers are multivalent and the Bologna conference, as well as the actions following this one
circumscribe in the sphere of these preoccupations: the schools, the universities play the part of motor for the
development of society and the reforms enhance this desideratum. The educational policy aims at fighting
against the fears that in relation to the requirements and to the tendencies in the future there should be a
diminution of the training quality. There are severely criticised and enhanced the limits of the training in
relation to the necessities, on all levels and forms of the education.
As regards higher education, here, too, because the administrative resources of higher education
institutions become more and more limited, the teachers must expose the scientific contents to a greater
number of the students. On the one hand, it is obvious that in these conditions, the direct communication
between teacher and student becomes even more difficult or even impossible, and the quality of learning
process could decrease [1] [2]. On the other hand, in the conditions of globalization and of the development
of a society based on knowledge, for the graduates, as active members of society, new tasks are required. It is
also important to add that, in a continuously changing world, the lectures given ex catedra do not attract the
student anymore.
These aspects are important for engineering education, particularly for electrical engineering education,
where the challenges in new fields as power engineering, control engineering, electronics, microelectronics,
signal processing engineering, telecommunications, instrumentation engineering, computers, are major. To
develop the professional competences and the moral profile of Homo Technicus Eminens, education must
have in view the new didactical strategies in which what, and how should be in multiple connections with the
new contents of pure and applied sciences, scientific research, and economical, ergonomic, moral,
philosophical aspects of real world [3] [4] [5].
The Higher Education is now involved in a real educational reform, in which active learning is the central
axis. New policy and strategies are proposed and new methods of the teaching-learning-evaluation process
are taken into account, both for teachers and students, in order to save time and to make the process efficient.
New Challenges in Engineering Education also appeared.
In the paper there is done a comparison between the traditional and interactive method.

2. Interactive methods in the teaching -learning process

In comparison with the situation of a traditional learning in which the teachers expose or read the lectures
as emitters and students are passive parts as receivers, without any feedback, the active learning takes into
account the students and their learning needs, as the core of the system. The synergetic effects are produced
if the students are the active partner of the process: they use the learning resources through reading, writing,
talking, listening; they reflect on phenomena and processes, they can ask questions, evaluate the results,
consolidate the new knowledge and apply the information to the special field.
In active learning many strategies are proposed [6][11]: individual activities, peer activities, informal
working groups, cooperative-formal working groups, etc. The role of teacher/tutor is essential in establishing
the type of strategy – depending on the number of students, environment, spatial location, objectives of
syllabi/curricula, and the criterion of time. Some strategies recommend that lectures should not be
abandoned– the traditional and active methods could be combined, adding new values to the evaluation
process of teaching and learning. A comparison between the classical and modern methods clarifies the
specific characteristics (see Table 1, Table 2).

Table 1. Comparison between traditional and active learning.

Traditional learning Active learning

Lectures Work in tutorial
Knowledge transfer Building the knowledge
Syllabi Defining the objectives
Theory and concepts Conflict-situations/ problems
Knowledge acquisition Skill to learn
Deductive thinking Inductive thinking
Memorizing lectures Finding the information
Individual work Work in group
Exams Self-assessment /Formative evaluation

The interactive methods are oriented on new centres if interest, such as: group discussions, problem-
based learning, case studies, role interpreting, structured study groups, etc. It is foreseen that computer and
video-techniques would represent more attractive teaching methods.
Table 2. Comparative characteristics for the traditional and for the interactive methods of teaching-learning-evaluation.

Traditional methods Interactive methods

There is much taught, little learnt There is much learnt, little taught
Magistral lectures Tutorship in workshops
Knowledge transmission Knowledge building
Analytical syllabi Defining the objectives
Theory and concepts Problems/Situations
Knowledge acquisition Skill to learn
Deductive thinking Inductive thinking
Memorizing the lecture Searching for the information
Individual work Work in group
Exams Self-assessment/Formative evaluation

The interactive methods are close to the research methods (Table 3).
Table 3. Comparison between the interactive learning methods and the scientific method.

Scientific method Interactive instruction methods

Preliminary observation Clarifying the problem-situation
Elaborating a set of problems for the research Defining the problem and the set of questions
Choosing the hypotheses Choosing the hypotheses
Settling the experiments Settling the learning objectives
Collecting experimental data Collecting information, documentation
Checking the hypotheses Checking the hypotheses
Complementary experimentations Supplemetary documentation

The two methods are comparable:

- The students learn to use the knowledge within a professional context and to adapt the solutions to a
given situation;
- The students participate in an active manner to finding a working practice;
The two methods have the same pedagogical approach:
- They optimize the learning conditions;
 - They benefit from the interactivity and the interdisciplinarity;
- They favour the self-teaching;
- They adopt a professional approach;
- They encourage the professional development (creativity, autonomy, responsibility).
They have the same work stages:
- Setting the teams;
- Determining the problem situation and elaborating the theme /the problem or the project;
- Assigning the tasks and the terms;
- Individual work;
- Team work;
- Project/report drawing up.
Assessment/self-assessment and final evaluationwhich may be:
- Realizing a study in a professional manner,
- Drawing up a report / memorial/ and defending it,
- Adopting the formative evaluation and the self-assessment,
- Systematic evaluation and improvement of the working method.
But, these new working methods require proper training and appropriate skills for both teachers and
students, and especially the ability to work in virtual environments. In this paper, the problem-based learning
method is considered, and the specific steps used in designing the problems for electrical engineering
education and implementing PBL method are presented.

3. Problem-based learning in engineering education

A short History of PBL method

Problem-based Learning (PBL) is an active method of teaching and learning, which transfers the
responsibility of the learning process on the students. The method is based on the process of analyzing a
conflict/problem - situation and clarifying the sources of conflict based on the previous and newly acquired
knowledge. This way, the students have an active role in creating the problem, in analyzing and giving
solution/solutions. This approach increases their responsibility for learning and motivates them.
This new approach started in medical schools in the late 1960s. The concept of PBL, introduced by
Howard Barrows [12]-[15], was widely disseminated and implemented.
In 1992, several professors at the University of Delaware began adopting and adapting PBL methods for
undergraduate instruction in both introductory and advanced courses in a number of subjects.
This approach is useful for engineering education and can easily apply to it. But, some difficulties still
exist, for in engineering education the problem solving is a method generally and widely used and certain
confusion could appear when associating it to PBL method [23].
Many European universities began applying this type of active learning by using the interactive method
[16]-[19]. In 1974, the University of Aalborg – Denmark declares its educational strategy in using problem-
based and project-organised learning as a teaching model [20]. The model is applied now in all study
programmes of the Faculties of Humanities, Social Science and Engineering and Science. In 2000, the
Catholic University of Leuven – Belgium launches Candis 2000 project, in which the innovative method of
PBL is to be applied in building engineering education [21]. The Universities of Maastricht, Paris 7 – Denis
Diderot, Louis Pasteur University of Strasbourg and many others have proposed training courses for teachers
and tutors as to get skills in designing and implementing the PBL method.
Some projects in education are also sustained and supported by the European Union, as appropriate means
in modernising the system of education. [22].
The Leonardo project COMPLETE [24], in which five European universities are involved – Transilvania
University of Brasov, Gent University, Paris 7- Denis Diderot University, Louis Pasteur University of
Strasbourg, and Uninova of Lisbon – also sets out to introduce innovation in using the interactive methods –
Problem-based Learning and Project-based Learning – applied to engineering education. The teachers as
trainees attend specific courses and they learn how to design the processes, how to assist the students to
promote thinking and discussion, to establish and maintain positive group dynamics, and to provide the
students with new resources. An e-platform sustained this innovative approach, applied also during running
the undergraduate study program in Electrical engineering and computer science, from Transilvania
University of Brasov.
The experience gained in this project proved that the efficiency of the PBL method largely depends on the
modality of scenario design, preparation and implementation [24]-[26].
 The steps for PBL method designing
The steps for designing the PBL scenario in engineering education consist in the following:
1. Establishing the PBL team of teaching staff;
- They “scan” the whole course to select parts that will be best served by PBL;
- A teacher-coordinator of the whole course is established, and more teachers are selected/elected for
each sequences;
2. Studying the different parts of the course
- The teaching staff proposes the way/modality of working;
3. Preparation of the support material for the students’ work;
- The teaching staff notes the selected bibliography and documentation resources (books, reports,
magazines, software, websites, etc.),
4. Selection of the tutors;
5. Choosing/designing the lab facilities (if is necessary);
6. Defining the agenda;
- Dates of the group meetings,
- Dates of the tutors/students meetings,
- Date of the report/project delivery,
- All the teachers involved agreed on the agenda of the course;
7. Preparing the ways for a good communication
- The teaching staff assured different way for the groups of both teachers/tutors and students.
Some remarks should be made:
- This step asks a lot of discussions on the content of each proposed problem/project;
- It is time-consuming to establish the scenario, and to sustain the students in asking the good questions and
finding the proper answers, and to evaluate the study results;
- In this step the modalities and didactical materials are established: bibliography, lectures, tutorials, case
studies etc. (Fig.1).

Bibliography Lectures Study groups

Problem based
Problem setting Learning Evaluation

Tutorials Case studies Experiments

Fig.1. Some elements for implementing the PBL method.

The steps for PBL method implementing

In order to implement the PBL method the steps followed the learning process: it opens with the
exposition/setting of the problem situation - the students are invited to discuss among them starting from a
problematic situation from real life; they ask the questions, and some of the questions are the learning
objectives themselves;
The analysis of the problem will lead them to the learning objectives. Thus, the acquired knowledge is re-
activated and the students are motivated to find answers to their own learning objectives, through a dynamic
and independent work. The problem solution/solutions prepare the students to think in a critical and
analytical way, and to find and use appropriate learning resources. They can use biographical resources,
participate in lectures, use case studies, experiments, and Internet resources (Fig. 1).
 The actors involved in this process are: teachers, tutors and students (Table 4), each of them having
specific responsibilities:
- Teachers - introducing the concept and rational use of PBL problem within the course/module and
defining the scenario;
- Tutors - guiding the student and assuring the dynamics of student groups;
- Students – as active part in acquiring and producing knowledge, they have a key role in the group once
defined: there is demanded the role of a leader, a scribe and a speaker.
The group of the teacher and that of the tutor have the main responsibility in problem designing and implementing.
In the process of implementing the PBL method, the important questions should be solved:
• How to choose an appropriate situation/problem?
• How to present the situation/problem?
• What kind of learning resources should be used?
• How to apply the facilities of information technology?
• Is it necessary to solve the problem?
• How to validate the learning outcomes?
All these questions are challenges for teachers /tutors, and they should find the efficient ways of solving
them.
As a field of research, PBL is still in the development stage. For example, there is not sufficient research or
empirical data to state that PBL is a proven alternative to other forms of instruction [21]. But, based on
evidence data over the past ten years, PBL appears to be a better model for producing gains in academic
achievement, although the results vary with the quality of the project and the level of student engagement.
Also, it seems that PBL is not appropriate as a method for teaching basic skills such as reading or
computation. Data show that PBL enhances the quality of learning and leads to higher-level cognitive
development through the students' complying with complex, novel problems [27]. Accomplishing these
goals, both teachers and students have to master the strategies necessary for designing successful PBL.
Table 4. Steps, phases and actors in PBL method design and implementation.

Main steps Phases Actors

Making a scenario according to learning objectives Teacher
I-Teacher group Defining/creating the situation problems Teacher
II-Tutor group Presenting the situation-problem Tutor
1. Identifying and clarifying the terms Tutor and students
2. Defining the problem and drawing a list of processes to clarify Tutor and students
III-Group work 3. Analyzing the problem and emitting/proposal/ the hypothesis Tutor and students
4. Systematizing the hypothesis Tutor and students
5. Clarifying the learning objectives Tutor and students
IV-Individual work 6. Individual study Students
V-Validation the 7. Systematizing and validating the solution and the hypothesis Tutor and students
knowledge 8. Tutorial evaluation Tutor and students
VI-Self-evaluation 9. Self and peer evaluation/ Individual balance/efficiency of the results Students

The relevant and engaging instructional models should be developed in concordance with learning
environment.
4. Case Study – Designing a problem for electrical engineering

What kind of problem is there raised?

• There is raised a practical problem, from the real life, which covers the area of study proposed in order
to be explored by the students;
• The chosen case has to be sufficiently well defined, with a clear and concrete objective, so that the
students should be stimulated and motivated to search for solutions;
• The submitted case may be unidisciplinary, however the interdisciplinarity is recommended (comprising
technical, economic, socio-cultural, ethical, legislative aspects etc.), being adapted to the course
 attendant’s/student’s level of knowledge; this fact will allow the development and the further evolution
of the problem thinking, in the measure in which there is acquired knowledge;
• There is recommended to raise problems that should allow different modalities for collecting the
information (interrogation, noticing, experimentation) and that should present several variants of
solutions.
The research indicate the stages that to be gone through in designing the Scenario of a problem:
Stage I: Determining the learning objectives,
Stage II: Determining the key words, which cover the area of study,
Stage III: Enunciation of the conflict situation:
a) There is usually presented to the students a conflict state/situation / a disequilibrium in connection with
the economic background, security, environment, socio-cultural background, disequilibrium that has a
few symptoms or groups of symptoms;
b) The situation of disequilibrium between the DEMAND and the OFFER may be presented on different
levels of solving the issue .
Example:
- level 1: the users’ demand for motor vehicles exceeds or is lesser than the offer/capacity of
circulation in the road transport;
- level 2 (it makes reference to the values that characterize the demand and the offer): the
disequilibrium may be presented through the number of motor vehicles necessary for the
transporter, which is lesser or greater than the number of sampling motor vehicles that circulate
upon a road segment in the unit of time.
c) The enunciation of the conflict situation is adapted to local, practical, situations, such as:
In Brasov on Mureşenilor Street, there are currently taking place traffic jams.
The jam is a symptom of a disequilibrium whose main causes are to be set together with the
students. Starting from these causes, the students will formulate their learning needs.
The enunciation for the problem situation will be easier to formulate if there is used a formal
exprimation: Although...., However...
Although on the level of the city of Braşov, the number of motor vehicles has not increased
dramatically during the last year, however on Mureşenilo rstreet there are currently taking place
traffic jams.
Such an enunciation describes more eloquently the conflict situation, in whose solving the students are
invitated to participate.
d) In the enuciation, there also have to be mentioned the students’ tasks, such as:
We propose for you to determine:
a) which are the symptoms and the characteristics of this situation,
b) which are the causes,
c) which are the possible remedies/ modalities for solving them,
d) to define the general solution/problem in order to solve this conflict situation,
e) to determine the learning objectives,
f) after the documentation, resorting to the resources in the submitted subchapter and other
resources indicated in this subchapter, fill up the dictionar of terms with the corresponding
definitions for the submitted key words and others you have set
g) draw up the map of the concepts
h) draw up a paper that should describe the activity carried out and the solutions; the paper will
be uploaded on the web page of the group and will lay at the basis of the evaluation of the
group activity.
Stage IV: Drawing up indications for the tutor
a) The enunciation of the problem might be:
In order to prevent the apparition of the traffic jam, there has to be maintained the equilibrium
between the demand and offer of transport, through the adequate correlation of the parameters of
the road traffic.
b) The possible learning objectives proposed/set by the course attendants, together with the tutor:
 - To define the concepts of road traffic and road flux,
- To know the parameters of the road traffic,
- To identify the connection between these concepts.
c) Map of the concepts
The map/the graphic of the concepts has to link in logical connection the clarified concepts and the
connections among these ones.
d) Group paper
It has to comprise all required elements, with the observance of the time graphic submitted for
PBL.
e) Planning the activities
It is carried out by the tutor, who sets the number of face-to-face necessary meetings and the total
working duration.

In electrical engineering, as in any field of education, a good problem for PBL method implementation has
to have the specific characteristics:
- to be engaged and oriented to the real world,
- to generate multiple hypotheses,
- to require team effort,
- to be consistent with the desired learning outcomes,
- to build upon the previous knowledge and experience,
- to promote development of higher order cognitive skills.
Problem should follow-up
- Resources to be identified and evaluated
- Summary of the problem
- Reassessment of the problem
- Group evaluation
- Knowledge abstract and summary
- Definitions, concepts, principles outlined
- Diagrams, lists, maps, flow charts generated.
With respect to these facts, in this paper a case study on designing the problem for PBL method and on
establishing the best scenario for the implementation the PBL. A simple case in electrical engineering field is
considered: the electric capacitor.
Motivation of choosing this theme:

In electrical engineering, the capacitor is a good example of the passive component in which many
electrical processes are developed. This is an opportunity to activate the old concepts and to discover
new concepts in electrical engineering education. The tutor can use these situations to define the
problems in which some old concepts can be activated (Electrical field; physical quantities: electric
charge, capacitance, electric energy; ideal capacitor), and other new concepts should be developed and
applied (Static and Dynamic processes of charging and discharging, Real capacitor, Equivalent schema,
Dynamic characteristics; Ageing of the materials; Reliability of the capacitor; etc.).

Many new technologies and manufactory techniques have improved the electric characteristics of the
capacitors, so that the new applications have been proposed in different domains. One of the most
exciting applications is the use of the capacitors for the electrical energy storage. The capacitor is also an
important element for supplying the vehicles, for energy saving, or smoothing the peak voltage in power
networks, etc.

The students from the undergraduate courses in electrical engineering are interested in these problem-
situations.
Designing the problem, having as field of application electric capacitor, follows the scenario in accordance
with the strep of usual PBL process running:
I. Start meeting
The objective of the start meeting of the student group and the tutor is to expose the problem-situation, to
analyze and to define the problem, to establish the learning objectives and the individual tasks.

Problem-situation exposing: The tutor exposes the problem-situation
Example: Many electrical capacitors are used today for energy storage, but, the performance does not
meet the requirements.

Problem-situation analyzing: The students ask questions to clarify the significant elements of the
problem-situation, as:
Example: What is a capacitor? How is energy accumulated in a capacitor? What happens when electric
voltage is applied? Is it possible to represent a real capacitor? Could the SPICE program be used in
showing the charging process? etc.
The students organize the questions and define the problem. Having in view that they are in the second
year of the study program, it is most probable that they would choose as problems:
How to reduce the charging time for an electric capacitor? or
Does temperature have a great influence on the charging time? or
What charging-discharge characteristics are required for the energy stocking capacitors?
Together with the tutor they will give some explanations, by using the previous knowledge. Organizing the
explanations and establishing the priorities will lead them to a reflection – synthesis of the possible
mechanisms.

Establishing learning objectives: The organization of the explanations by identifying the priorities, the
connections between different mechanisms and the incertitude of explanations will allow them to
represent the synthesis of the concepts as a diagram or a tree, which will define their own new learning
objectives. These could be:
To clarify the charge-discharge processes in capacitors
To clarify what a real capacitor is
To introduce different equivalent schema for a real capacitor
To establish the mathematical model for different equivalent schema
To apply the electrical circuit methods in finding the static characteristics, etc.
The student group will plan the tasks for each person of the group and a list of questions/tasks is drawn.

II. Individual/autonomous study

The objective of this step is to achieve the learning objectives, to collect and to manage the information
with the aim of problem explanation, and to acquire the competences and skills for an autonomous learning.

Each student will use the biographical references, papers, readings, lab applications, and computer
applications to find the explanations for the list of questions. The individual study is the most important
step, and here, the tutor should give advice: in identifying the appropriate source of information, in
offering suggestions, in facilitating the access to the computer programs etc.
The students should also use some computer techniques. For example, they can propose a simulation of the
real RC serial capacitor supplied with various wave form of voltage, with a software as SPICE program.
This program offers the possibility to study the voltage dependency of the real capacitor and to obtain the
charge characteristic of the capacitor, the influence of the temperature on the charge time, by modifying the
material parameters of the capacitor. Solving this problem, new questions will be generated, like:
What is a step signal?
What is the significance of the time constant of the RC circuit?
What is the connection between the time constant of a RC circuit and charge time?
What is and for what a marker is used? Etc.
In this step, each student will note on the list of questions / tasks the plausible explanations and also the
points of ambiguities.

III. Meeting for common use of acquired knowledge

This step has as objective to realize the balance of group, and to evaluate if the learning objectives are
achieved. The students present the results of their individual study, interpret them and establish the final
results. This step is important for the stability of the group, and for the working environment. Each student
should also propose an individual result of the learning objectives.
The discussions will generate further questions. For example, from the RC circuit:
Is the time corresponding to the final voltage on the capacitor proportional to the external resistance
Rext?
Which is the connection between charge time and value of external resistance?
Which is connection between the increase of temperature and charge time?
These questions will generate other further problems/problem-situations, such as:
 How could the charge-discharge times be modified?
The model used in Figure 2 does not allow obtaining voltage characteristics in the charge-discharge
process!
During this meeting the students could build a map of concepts used in this problem, like in Fig. 2 and they
could explain the connections, or to propose new connections

Armatures Capacitor as Electric

Charge Storage Field

Metal
Energy & Electrical
Dielectrics Forces Circuits
Semi-
conductor

Electrolyte Organics Charge/Discharge

Nonorganics Regimes

Thin Film Nano-

Technologies Technologies Modelling &
Simulating

Real
Capacitor

Fig. 2. Concept map for electric capacitor used for energy storage.

This problem was experimented and the results are the growing interest for this domain, and the
acquisition of new knowledge and skills by experimentation and using software programs.
5. Conclusions
In this paper a comparison between the traditional and interactive method is done. Due to the evident
advantages, in higher education it is a necessity to introduce new teaching-learning-evaluation methods. It is
also useful and appropriate to incorporate and to apply to electrical engineering the interactive methods. The
PBL is an attempt to create new instructional practices reflecting the environment in which students live and
learn now. Different strategies can be applied, depending on several criteria: the number of students, special
environment, and objectives of syllabi/curricula, time requirements.
The PBL model establishes the specific steps and responsibilities for the actors involved in this process:
teachers, tutors and students. The model was implemented to the undergraduate study program in Electrical
engineering and computer science from Transilvania University of Brasov.
The electric capacitor is a good example how different problems can be formulated and used in the PBL
method implementation, and computer could sustain the solving problems and the generation of the new
themes. Interdisciplinarity is the key word of this approach.

Acknowledgement
The research work has been developed in the framework of the project "CEREX – Models and Indicators
for the Evaluation of Scientific Research in Universities in the Context of Knowledge Based Society", No.
Cex 06-8-85/ 19.02.2006, granted by Excellence Research Program of Romanian Government.

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