Enhancing EFL profession-based vocabulary acquisition through 3D engineering animation for engineering students
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Дата
2023-05-24
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Видавець
Latvia University of Life Sciences and Technologies
Анотація
Today, a majority of agricultural farms are equipped with a new type of farm machinery, tractors, which require high-quality knowledge, skills and abilities from engineers. Therefore, the ability to describe the objects, mechanisms and working schemes is a priority for future agricultural engineers. Before COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine, most ESP classes were held in specially equipped laboratories, where students could study agricultural machinery and equipment on layouts. Ukrainian educators search for alternative teaching tools to enable effective distance learning of future agricultural engineers. Three-dimensional environments can be very useful to examine agricultural machinery parts. The purpose of this experiment was to test the effectiveness of 3-D engineering animation in improving profession-based vocabulary acquisition. A two-group post-test comparative pedagogical experiment was conducted with the second-year agricultural engineering students (n = 30) during the spring semester of the academic year 2022. A series of online 3-D engineering animations was adapted with the students of the experimental group to reinforce the course content and develop vocabulary skills in participants. The achievement profession-based vocabulary test with experimental and control groups was carried out. The number of participants in each group is equal (n1 = 15, n2 = 15), so the boundary value of Хb at a 5%- level of significance for N = 30 is 4.88. The statistical interpretation of the test results based on the Van der Waerden criterion shows that Xf > Hb, respectively, 8.85 > 4.88. The differences in the results obtained are statistically significant (X = 8.85 at P < 0.05), which allows us to assert the effectiveness of training engaged in the experimental group.
Опис
The problem of training highly qualified personnel is still relevant for Ukraine. This is why national stakeholders who participate in designing educational-professional training programmes at technical universities along with technical engineering knowledge indicate the need for acquiring sound ESP skills. In today’s world, potential employers from all over the world seek graduates able to communicate with counterparts across the globe in general and professional contexts, present engineering ideas to decision-makers in presentations, meetings, and reports, and explain complex ideas and new technologies.
Therefore, when studying ESP, the ability to describe a specific device of the object, the working scheme, the interaction of nodes and mechanisms, and to communicate on technical characteristics and features of agricultural machinery and equipment becomes a priority. In the post-COVID and pre-war periods, most ESP classes with engineering students were carried out in specially equipped laboratories, where students could master profession-based foreign language vocabulary; describe the construction and operation of machinery with the help of full-size layouts. In the distance learning setting, foreign language instructors started to explore the virtual tools that could replace natural means (mechanisms and components, devices, tools, samples of parts). In this respect, we believe that utilizing semi-immersive virtual reality, 3D animations and presentations in particular can substitute ESP classes in engineering laboratories and show good achievements compared to using a textbook with illustrations during Zoom classes.One of the possible solutions to promote the functioning of engineering education in the global context is providing 3D animated-based activities (animated presentations, computer animation or digital animation, or computational mimics) in engineering learning. Animation has a potential role in supporting the visualization of dynamic processes, such as those not easily observable in real space and time scales, real processes that are practically impossible to realize in a learning situation, or a process that is not inherently visual.
Ключові слова
3-D animation, agricultural engineering, ESP, profession-based, vocabulary acquisition
Бібліографічний опис
Chaikovska O., Niskhodovska O., Spivachuk V., Kruk A. Enhancing EFL profession-based vocabulary acquisition through 3D engineering animation for engineering students // 22 International Scientific Conference Engineering for Rural Development, May 24-26, 2023. P. 407-412.