COMPUTERS AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF DESIGN DECISION-MAKING SKILLS

We are concerned with supporting engineering students as they acquire the critical thinking skills which are needed in design practice and, in particular, with exploring the requirements of a computer based too l to support students in the acquisition of design decision making ski lls. In this paper, we describe the current implementation of a decisi on support tool and discuss some of the background and context which h ave influenced the design. The decision support tool consists of a spr eadsheet-like data manipulation component, in which information releva nt to the decision making task can be noted and manipulated, together with a dialogue component which collaborates with the student, encoura ging them to articulate and reflect on both the current problem and th eir problem solving strategy, and providing help and explanations when required. So far, a first prototype of this decision support tool has been implemented and a period of formative testing has been carried o ut. The results of this test have been used to guide modifications to the design and implementation of the tool.