1 An International Collaboration to Promote Inquiry-based Learning in Undergraduate Engineering Classrooms 1 D’Arcy C. Randall, 1 Christy Moore, 2,3 Isabel S. Carvalho The University of Texas at Austin, USA, darcyr@mail.utexas.edu; christym@mail.utexas.edu 1 ; ISEL, Lisbon, Portugal, icarvalho@moonlight.pt 2 IDMEC/FEUP, Porto, Portugal 3 Abstract Theorists such as Bransford et al. argue that twenty-first century educators need to teach students to do more than simply remember and repeat information. Engineering educators Prince and Felder critique traditional methods of teaching in which instructors focus on mathematics and theory, but fail to convey practical applications of that knowledge. They advocate moving students to a higher level of learning - past the stage of memorizing and reciting data - to more sophisticated methods of analysis, synthesis, and application of knowledge. To enact such transformations, Prince and Felder recommend “inductive teaching methods,” including “inquiry-based learning,” in which students learn through engaging with challenges and a series of questions. The purpose of this paper is to describe specific techniques of “inquiry-based learning” employed by three instructors in Engineering schools, one in Europe and two in the USA. The paper provides examples of inquiry-based learning activities from each of the authors. The paper then discusses the cross-pollination of ideas and describes how the authors have shared inquiry-based teaching strategies and collaborated to develop new and relevant assignments and approaches to teaching. 1. Introduction The three authors of this paper met at an Engineering Education conference in Budapest, Hungary. While perusing the posters, one author laughed out loud. Curious, another author asked what was so funny, and the first pointed out the multiple posters featuring Venn diagrams showing the intersection of three sets. It was as if our colleagues—hundreds of engineering educators from six continents—had attended the same school, in which we absorbed Venn diagrams as a common language. In one way, the laugh has turned out to be on us, for this paper results from a three-way international collaboration reminiscent of the infamous Venn diagram. Yet what the diagram does not convey is the dynamic quality of that collaboration, a dynamism that springs from our shared interest in “inquiry-based teaching and learning” [1]. Inquiry-based teaching encourages students to learn through engaging with challenges and a series of questions. As Bateman [1] puts it, “The job is to teach students how to think, not what to think” (p. 197). Contemporary “inquiry-based” methods frequently draw from theory by Bransford et al., who argue that educators need to teach students, among other things, to examine their previous knowledge before building on it. Students should be aware of their knowledge, and its limits [2]. In the field of engineering education, Prince and Felder include inquiry-based teaching under the broader umbrella of “inductive teaching methods,” which they advocate to move students to a higher level of learning - past the stage of memorizing and