The Design and Empirical Evaluation of a Chemical Process Visualization Tool to Help Introductory Chemical Engineering Students Solve Material Balance Problems

Résumé du livre

For students in introductory chemical engineering courses, material balance problems pose a formidable barrier to success. Prior studies have confirmed that students need additional help beyond class lectures to solve material balance problems. Computer software constitutes one potential source of help. While commercial software systems for solving material balance problems exist, due to their complexity, they are inappropriate for students first learning to solve material balance problems. To explore the potential for specialized educational software to help students solve material balance problems and ultimately succeed in introductory chemical engineering courses, this thesis develops and empirically evaluates ChemProV, a specialized software tool specifically designed to help introductory chemical engineering students visualize and solve material balance problems. As students work through a material balance problem using ChemProV, the tool provides scaffolding in the form of feedback messages. The messages generated by the system aim to motivate students to correct problems without giving specific solutions. An experimental evaluation compared the software against the traditional medium for solving material balance problems--pen and paper. In our quantitative analysis of the study, ChemProV failed to show any significant performance advantage over pen and paper. The data shows that 10 participants out of a total 21 created more accurate overall solutions using ChemProV. The average accuracy of the solutions created using ChemProV is 69.07% and of solutions created using Pen and Paper is 54.56% for those 10 participants. The statistical test shows positive trend indicating that students with low grades in the class were benefited more by ChemProV as compared to students who got grades above average in the class. We examine why ChemProV failed to show significant performance advantage, and propose directions for further research for enhancing novice chemical engineering visualization environments and improving the learning experience of students.