Sustainability of Project-Based Learning by Incorporating Transdisciplinary Design in Fabrication of Hydraulic Robot Arm

• Main Authors: Taha Farid, Sara Ali, Muhammad Sajid, Khalid Akhtar
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-07-01
• Series: Sustainability
• Subjects: project-based learning; robotics education; transdisciplinary perspective; complex engineering problem; problem-based learning
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/14/7949

Wider acceptance of project-based learning (PjBL) in the tertiary education industry has been obstructed by its resource-intensive nature. This paper introduces a transdisciplinary variant of PjBL for undergraduate engineering students through a multidisciplinary complex engineering problem requiring the design and fabrication of a hydraulic robot arm. The robotics-inspired transdisciplinary PjBL variant was first evaluated through student feedback using the Chi-square hypothesis test, which, at Chi-square (4, N = 101) = 129.12; <i>p</i> < 0.05, revealed a statistically significant difference in the proportion of the student feedback in favor of the PjBL for sustainability of transdisciplinary project-based learning. Furthermore, the students’ PjBL and PbBL scores were subjected to the Mann–Whitney U test which concluded the effectiveness of PjBL against PbBL with statistical significance, U(N = 101) = 192.00, z = −11.826, <i>p</i> < 0.05. The results indicate that the novel transdisciplinary project-based learning (PjBL) approach develops students’ practical engineering knowledge spanning multiple disciplines, thereby resulting in a sustainable concept of project-based learning.