Application of hands-on simulation games to improve classroom experience

ABSTRACT

While many construction companies claim substantial productivity and profit gains when applying lean construction principles, it remains a challenge to teach these principles in a classroom. Lean construction emphasises collaborative processes and integrated delivery practices. Consequently, new teaching methods that nurture such values should form the basis of lean construction education. One of the proposed methods is ‘hands-on team simulation games’ which can be employed to replicate various real-life processes, projects, or systems for the purpose of teaching, analysing, and understanding. This study aims at assessing this simulation games and understanding their impact on students’ learning and satisfaction. Surveys and tests are administered to assess changes in student’s perception of their learning styles and their understanding of key lean construction concepts. Results show a positive student reaction to hands-on simulation games, provide pedagogical insights, and highlight suggestions for improvement.

KEYWORDS:

• Simulation games
• active learning
• engineering education
• gamification
• lean construction

Acknowledgements

The authors thank all students who participated in the study. All findings and conclusions expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not reflect those of the contributors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Dr Farook Hamzeh is an Assistant Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the American University of Beirut (AUB). He earned his Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley in 2009. He became a faculty member at Colorado State University between 2009 and 2011. Dr Hamzeh has worked for more than seven years in the construction industry in Lebanon, Qatar, Dubai, and the United States on several mega projects. Throughout his career, Dr Hamzeh has developed a passion for improving construction processes to increase productivity, raise customer value, and reduce process waste. This passion has fuelled his research in the areas of lean construction, process simulation and improvement, production planning, building information modelling (BIM), and supply chain management.

Christina Theokaris is a graduate of the University College London. She earned her bachelor’s degree with distinction from the American University of Beirut. She worked as a research intern at the University of Wisconsin Madison in the Center for Freight & Infrastructure for Research & Education on a study addressing environmental justice in transportation. Throughout her undergraduate years, Christina has been a main contributor to the Civil Engineering Newsletter. She has been writing articles for each issue since 2010 and became news editor in 2012 editing newsletter articles and giving authors sessions on improving their writing skills.

Carel Rouhana graduated with a master’s degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the American University of Beirut. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Notre Dame University. She is working for MAN contracting in Lebanon and has previously worked at MIDMAC Contracting in Qatar on the new Doha International Airport. She has also worked on design projects for civil engineering concrete and steel structures and on an elevated highway project involving geotechnical, structural, and geometric design. Her previous work has honed her interest in construction-related issues such as resource management, waste management, scheduling, and lean construction.

Yara Abbas graduated with a master’s degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the American University of Beirut. She has finished her bachelor’s degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the American University of Beirut. Her graduate work involved developing a framework for evaluating the cost of design clashes. She is a specialist in BIM and has worked with various BIM consultants and BIM management companies. She is passionate about improving the BIM process for managing the design and execution of construction projects.

Additional information

Funding

This research is supported by the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SOTL) Grant ‘Employing Discussion Forums and Hands-on Team Simulation Exercises to Enhance Active Learning in Lean Construction Education’, funded by The Center For Teaching and Learning (CTL) at the American University of Beirut [22137].