A narrative inquiry into developing learner agency of engineering students in an intercultural PBL environment

ABSTRACT

This study explores how engineering students develop learner agency in an intercultural PBL (problem- and project-based learning) environment, along with the factors that affect their development. Theoretically, learner agency is framed within three interrelated dimensions: intrapersonal, behavioural, and environmental. A narrative inquiry approach is adopted to investigate 11 engineering master’s students’ perceptions of their agency development. The findings reveal 10 elements perceived as ways to develop learner agency of engineering students, namely belief in their own self-efficacy, motivation, global engineering identity, goal-setting, planning, monitoring, reflecting, trust building, team atmosphere, and support from supervisors and institutions. These results also show that different factors affect the building of learner agency for engineering students, such as students’ experiences before undertaking a master’s degree, their level of advancement in the program, the culture of each study program, communication styles, and the composition of the project group.

KEYWORDS:

• Engineering students
• intercultural environment
• learner agency
• narrative inquiry
• PBL

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dan Jiang

Dan Jiang is a PhD student in the UNESCO Center for Problem-Based Learning in Engineering Science and Sustainability (UCPBL Center), Aalborg University, Denmark. She obtained her master’s degree in the history of education in Beijing Normal University, China. Her research focuses on intercultural learning, first-year adaptability and learner agency in a PBL context.

Bettina Dahl

Bettina Dahl Søndergaard is Associate Professor in the UNESCO Center for Problem-Based Learning in Engineering Science and Sustainability (UCPBL Center), Aalborg University, Denmark and a professor of mathematics education at the University of Bergen (Norway). She has a M.Sc. (cand.scient.) in Mathematics from Aalborg University and M.Sc. in Educational Research Methodology from University of Oxford (U.K.) and her Ph.D. is in Mathematics Education from Roskilde University (DK). Previously, she was an Associate Professor of Aarhus University (DK) working with educational development in higher education in science and mathematics. Before that she was Assistant Professor at Virginia Tech (U.S.A.) working with mathematics teacher training for the secondary level and previously, she was an Advisor at the Norwegian Centre for Mathematics Education at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Xiangyun Du

Xiangyun Du is a Professor in the UNESCO Center for Problem-Based Learning in Engineering Science and Sustainability (UCPBL Center), Aalborg University, Denmark. She has a substantial number of publications on pedagogical development, particularly problem-based and PBL methods and intercultural teaching and learning. She has also engaged with educational institutions in over 20 countries in substantial work on pedagogy and curricula development.