Advances in Engineering Education - Winter 2012 - Star Power for Teaching Professional Skills to Engineering Students

Oct 15, 2026

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This study evaluates the potential of the game Star Power to teach professional skills to mechanical engineering undergraduates. The game was implemented as an activity within a final-year Professional Practice unit, and student perceptions were collected via a questionnaire administered after a summer break. Results show that most participants believed they improved professional skills through gameplay. Although the game is often used in sociology teaching, it offers a rich, versatile setting for developing engineer-relevant professional skill elements.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages13

Reading Time33 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Introduction

Star Power

Game goal and scoring

Status categories

| | Ad | vances in Engineering Edu | cation | | | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | WINTER 2012 Star Power for teaching professional skills to engineering students SUK MENG GOH Curtin University of Technology Sarawak Sarawak, Malaysia ABSTRACT The objective of this study is to evaluate the potential of a game called Star Power to teach professional skills to mechanical engineering undergraduates. The game was conducted as an activity in a final year Professional Practice unit. A survey in the form of a questionnaire was administered to participating students in the following semester of studies after a summer break. The survey showed that the majority of the students believed they had improved their professional skills from playing Star Power. Although the game is typically used in the teaching of sociology, this study demonstrated that the game can provide a rich and versatile setting in which different elements of professional skills that are important to an engineer can be incorporated and developed. Keywords: Game, simulation, engineering, professional skills INTRODUCTION An engineer today requires not just strong technical capabilities to succeed in his or her career, but also skills in communication and persuasion, the ability to lead and work effectively as a team member, and an understanding of the non-technical forces that affect engineering decisions [1] . Asa result of these workplace demands, there has been an increase in emphasis on professional skills in higher engineering academic programs [2] . Initiatives to incorporate professional skills within formal engineering education have been pursued in many countries including Australia [3,4] and Malaysia [5] . The learning of professional skills may be implemented in various forms, ranging from team projects to individual units in the academic curriculum [1,2] . An extensive discussion of these activities has been presented by Shuman et al. [1] . However, each activity is not without challenges to WINTER 2012 1 ADVANCES IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION Star Power for teaching professional skills to engineering students administer. For example, experiential activities that resemble‘real’workplace conditions are more difficult for the instructor to manage as well as being resource intensive and time consuming for the students [1] . On the other hand, if the activities do not accurately mimic the real-world situation then there is a danger that the learning outcomes may be misleading [6] . Students may also delineate between the academic context and the‘real’ practice, thus behaving differently in class [7] . In addition, formal lessons that involve traditional lectures may not be appropriate in the teaching of professional skills, and are therefore not popular with students [2] . A particular challenge in teaching professional skills is that inherently, professional skills are difficult to define and measure [8] . For example, effective communication skills could be identified as fluency in a particular language or the ability to use technology during presentation [5] . However, effective communication skills at the workplace mean more than just being able to articulate well. They include being able to show empathy, negotiate, interact and influence to obtain the expected results. Shuman et al. [1] proposed that professional skills be divided into two groups. The first group comprises the ‘process’ skills where students learn a robust process to address each skill. The other group comprises the ‘awareness’ skills where students learn how to be aware of the importance of each one and to include them in their problem-solving activities. The lack of contextual clarity in professional skills education calls for innovative but simple pedagogical strategies that allow for real student participation and learning. To this purpose, various methods have been proposed in the literature. For example, the usage of

FAQs

What is the objective of the study about Star Power?

The study aims to evaluate whether Star Power can teach professional skills to mechanical engineering undergraduates.

How was the game implemented and how were students assessed?

Star Power was used as an activity in a final-year Professional Practice unit, and students completed a questionnaire administered after a summer break.

What do the survey results indicate about students’ professional skills?

The majority of students reported that playing Star Power improved their professional skills.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Terk