Online games using Scratch were designed to help students acquire knowledge of molecular biology and biochemistry, which are fundamental to biotechnology. The games were created to enhance understanding of RNA codon tables, the structure of amino acid side chains, the names and structures of organic compounds, the overview of metabolic maps, and English vocabulary related to biotechnology. The students played those games during their classes. The effectiveness of the games was evaluated by a questionnaire. The students rated the games as helpful for their understanding of the classes, whereas the English vocabulary games received lower ratings. Overall, the study showed that the lecturers were able to develop learning games in Scratch and utilize them in a classroom setting even without needing to have any previous programming experience.

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This paper presents an example of a PBL (Project-based Learning) framework focused on “the social implementation of robotics” and involving a collaboration between a local company using Robot System Integrator (SIer) and academics in the robotics field. The purpose of this research is to present a template for how robot system integrators can be trained in the future. The functions of typical robots can be divided into two types: “end effectors” such as picking hands, and safety devices such as sensors with IoT. A key feature of our program is training students on the creation and use of industrial robots, making use of the robots provided by the local company. This is followed by the same company’ s engineers directly evaluating students’ products. The educational material developed by the authors makes use of an IoT security kit. Students also learn in detail about sensor components and sensor solutions. Upon evaluating the program, the study authors concluded that students in the mechanical engineering field are indeed able to acquire basic robot Sler skills through these PBL assignments. The trial was valuable not only for the participating students but also for the teaching staff.

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COVID-19 has had a number of significant effects on academic affairs at College of Science and Technology, Nihon University, one of which was an observable change in students’ GPAs, occurring alongside a change in teaching methods from face-to-face to online. This paper details the changes in GPA scores during these years, as assessed under the absolute grading system. Based on the results of the previous studies, two groups are introduced in the data analyses of the pre-COVID and pandemic years: the students who had taken the entrance examination before the turn of the year and those after the turn. The former group, who had showed lower overall GPA scores than the latter group in pre-COVID years, were also found to have achieved better GPAs in pandemic years. One hypothesis to explain this is that they may have benefitted from the nature of online classes, including facets such as “on-demand” learning and a greater tendency towards repetitive learning methods in general.

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We planned lessons incorporating Team-Based Learning (TBL) to foster students’ thorough critical thinking skills. To effectively implement TBL, we adopted the ARCS model as a motivational instructional framework and introduced ‘Mid-tech’ as materials from students’ respective departments, aligning them with their future career prospects, aiming to enhance students’ motivation and initiative. Additionally, to enable students to effectively utilize Mid-tech and create an environment conducive to thorough thinking, we established cross-departmental TBL activities centered around the theme of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), that have garnered students’ attention in recent years and involve participants from nine different departments, each representing diverse fields. To facilitate discussions, students were entrusted with explaining their Mid-tech topics to peers from different departments. This paper assesses and reports on the applicability of this course design in a large class of approximately 300 students, in which enhancing educational effectiveness can be challenging if we rely solely on traditional teaching methods.

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In the clamping of vises on milling machines, a common issue arises where instructors use ambiguous language in their instructions. Therefore, this research investigated the relationship between the clamping force of the vise and the gripping force of the workpiece in order to quantify the clamping force of the vise. In the rough-machining process with milling tools, the clamping force of the vise that allows safe work and the clamping force of the vise when an instructor is teaching were investigated to determine the appropriate clamping force. In addition, operators were instructed using the developed clamping force visualization device, and the insights gathered from these investigations are summarized.

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During the COVID-19 pandemic, university students in Japan were subjected to a nationwide survey to determine the nature and level of stress, as well as their perspectives on online learning. In July 2021, a questionnaire survey of undergraduate and graduate students was conducted online, and 2,096 responses were received. Regarding the general stress experienced by university students, factors I (depression and anxiety) and III (apathy) were higher for overall respondents and male students. In contrast, all three investigated factors, factors I (depression and anxiety), II (moodiness and anger), and III (apathy), were higher for female students than they had been in a previous study. Regarding specific stress factors, the most common response was a lack of foresight regarding the future, such as employment and career prospects. Only 5.4% of respondents identified online education as the primary source of stress. Regarding university students’ evaluations of online learning, those who gave a positive review (53.5%) greatly exceeded those who gave a negative review (17.7%). Although the ease of understanding digital materials was not seen to be much of a problem, a substantial number of surveyed students did remark that the difficulty of remotely asking teachers and friends questions made online learning challenging. From the analysis of the 900 free text responses, ‘daily life’ and ‘academic life’ were extracted as the two broad categories that were of most concern to students. A further issue identified was that unlike regular classes, various types of hands-on activities and research activities has been significantly impeded during the pandemic period.

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Mobile phones and tablet PCs can be used in learning environments and treated as teaching materials similar to notebooks and textbooks through the use of applications and software. With these electronic devices, we can do things that cannot be realized with notebooks and textbooks, one of which is programming. The objective of this study is to develop physics simulation materials using Python so that learners can both understand physical phenomena and deepen their programming knowledge through the simulator. This paper shows two mock lessons as examples and indicates that our aimed educational effects, which were measured with questionnaires, can be obtained.

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In the Department of Applied Chemistry and Biotechnology at the National Institute of Technology Niihama College, Niihama College, a subject “Experiments of Fundamental Chemistry” is offered in the first year of the five-year experimental curriculum. In addition to providing introductory education on safety and basic operations, we have set some experimental themes in order to help beginning students become more interested in chemistry. Our aim is for these implementations to benefit students irrespective of whether they had a high or low level of chemistry knowledge at the start of the course. In this paper we report the examples of educational activities related to the introduction, practice, and improvement of established experimental themes. Among these themes, we specifically present the experimental method and educational effect of “paper making”.

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In the process of designing a modern product, the demands of industrial designers and engineers may conflict. The profession called design engineer can be of value in resolving this conflict. In this study, we proposed a design-engineering-oriented educational approach for industrial designers and introduced it into a postgraduate course. It was objectively confirmed that industrial designers’ experience of engineering development facilitated their understanding of technical difficulty and improved their ability to collaborate with engineers.

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