Cognitive Processes of Students Participating in Engineering-focused Design Instruction

Since the publication of the Standards for Technological Literacy in 2000 (ITEA), there have been a number of new programs developed that are designed to teach pre-engineering. Project Lead the Way is one such program. Project Lead the Way boasts serving over 1250 schools in 44 states and teaching over 160,000 students (McVearry, 2003). Efforts are also being made to infuse engineering design into technology education programs. One example of this is the work of the National Center for Engineering and Technology Education (NCETE) partnering with high school technology educators in summer in- service workshops to help teachers develop activities and curriculum to instill engineering design into technology education programs. According to Douglas, Iversen, & Kalyandurg (2004), the engineering community has identified the need for teaching engineering in K-12, and this has been supported by the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE). The ASEE research analyzed the current practices of K-12 engineering education.