Complete thesis - Murdoch University

Reporting findingsThis work has been presented at two international conferences and a national Teaching/LearningForum. In this context, these publications addressed the need to engage with educators andresearchers in education, as well as Software or Requirements Engineers and SE/RE educators.The Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA), holdsa prestigious conference with strict refereeing criteria for the publication of education research.Armarego and Clarke (2003), presented in that forum as a refereed paper focusedon the background to the approach undertaken during this cycle. The paper describes theissues of education for software development professions and discussed the development of thePBL-based model to address the adaptability skills and knowledge of Software Engineeringstudents. A reviewer’s comment indicates this project waswell grounded in the research literature [...] for Conferencepurposes it would be appropriate to recognise this paper as anexcellent brief review concerning high level outcomes sought increativity and divergent thinking in a disciplinary area moreusually noted for prescriptive curricula and convergentthinking. It sets out very strongly a basis for the research inprogress.The Teaching Learning Forum 2004 paper (Armarego, 2004b) described the PBL-based cyclein terms of addressing student preconceptions regarding the way they should learn. Thispaper describes the PBL environment provided, looks at the student cohort undertaking theunit in 2003, and describes their reaction to this alternative way of learning.Armarego (2004c) provides a more abstract view of the development of the PBL approachtaken: issues identified in education for engineering (in particular engineering of software);triggers for the PBL approach taken; and where the approach did and did not succeed.This paper pointed to the need to attempt a hybrid approach to learning in RequirementsEngineering.This work was described within a forum that addresses issues of interest to the RE profession,both practitioners and academics (Armarego, 2004a). Reviewer comments indicate avalidation of the findings:The paper shows extensive scholarship and considerable thoughtin research program design. The paper is very well written andcontains only a few tiny typographical errors.323