Abstract
Many studies highlight the importance of systems thinking and abstract thinking among engineers, especially as part of the Industry 4.0 framework. The study described in this paper characterized the relation between systems thinking and abstract thinking among high school students carrying out projects that combine hardware and software. Thirty-six Israeli 12th graders majoring in electronics participated in this study. The students filled out an anonymous Likert-like questionnaire used for evaluating their self-reported systems thinking and abstract thinking skills. Additionally, the students took a multiple-choice test examining systems thinking and abstract thinking. The findings indicate a significant moderate positive correlation between the two abilities, both in the questionnaire and the test. This correlation may have both theoretical and educational implications.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Schwab, K.: The 4th Industrial Revolution. Crown Business, New-York (2016)
Spöttl, G.: Development of “Industry 4.0” – are skilled workers and semi-engineers the losers? In: 7th World Engineering Education Forum, pp. 851–856 (2017)
Senge, P.M.: The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. Doubleday, New-York (1990)
Denning, P.J., Comer, D.E., Gries, D., Mulder, M.C., Tucker, A., Turner, A.J., Young, P.R.: Computing as a discipline. Computer 22(2), 63–70 (1989)
Gero, A., Danino, O.: High-school course on engineering design: enhancement of students’ motivation and development of systems thinking skills. Int. J. Eng. Educ. 32(1A), 100–110 (2016)
Lye, S.Y., Koh, J.H.L.: Review on teaching and learning of computational thinking through programming: what is next for K-12? Comput. Hum. Behav. 41, 51–61 (2014)
Frank, M.: Assessing the interest for systems engineering positions and other engineering positions’ required Capacity for Engineering Systems Thinking (CEST). Syst. Eng. 13(2), 161–174 (2009)
Hazzan, O., Kramer, J.: Assessing abstraction skills. Commun. ACM 59(12), 43–45 (2016)
Bertalanffy, L.V.: General Systems Theory: Foundation, Development, Applications. Brazillier, New-York (1968)
Jacobson, M.J., Wilensky, U.: Complex systems in education: scientific and educational importance and implications for the learning sciences. J. Learn. Sci. 15(1), 11–34 (2006)
Frank, M., Elata, D.: Developing the capacity for engineering systems thinking (CEST) of freshman engineering students. J. Syst. Eng. 8(2), 187–195 (2005)
Chen, D., Stroup, W.: General system theory: towards a conceptual framework for science and technology education for all. J. Sci. Educ. Technol. 2(3), 447–459 (1993)
Gero, A.: Enhancing systems thinking skills of sophomore students: an introductory project in electrical engineering. Int. J. Eng. Educ. 30(3), 738–745 (2014)
Ben-Zvi Assaraf, O., Orion, N.: Development of system thinking skills in the context of earth system education. J. Res. Sci. Teach. 42(5), 518–560 (2005)
Gero, A., Zach, E.: High school programme in electro-optics: a case study on interdisciplinary learning and systems thinking. Int. J. Eng. Educ. 30(5), 1190–1199 (2014)
Richmond, B.: Systems thinking: critical thinking skills for the 1990s and beyond. Sys. Dyn. Rev. 9, 113–133 (1993)
Kramer, J., Hazzan, O.: The role of abstraction in software engineering. In: 28th International Conference on Software Engineering, pp. 1017–1018 (2006)
Devlin, K.: Why universities require computer science students to take math. Commun. ACM 46(9), 37–39 (2003)
Liskov, B., Guttag, J.: Abstraction and Specification in Program Development. MIT Press, Cambridge (1986)
Tsui, F., Gharaat, A., Duggins, S., Jung, E.: Measuring levels of abstraction in software development. In: International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering, pp. 466–469 (2011)
Grover, S., Pea, R.: Computational thinking in K–12: a review of the state of the field. Educ. Res. 42(1), 38–43 (2013)
Koppelman, H., van Dijk, B.: Teaching abstraction in introductory courses. In: 15th Annual Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education, pp. 174–178 (2010)
Bennedssen, J., Caspersen, M.E.: Abstraction ability as an indicator of success for learning computing science? In: Fourth International Workshop on Computing Education Research, pp. 15–26 (2008)
Ye, N., Salvendy, G.: Expert-novice knowledge of computer programming at different levels of abstraction. Ergonomics 39(3), 461–481 (1996)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Gero, A., Shekh-Abed, A., Hazzan, O. (2020). Correlation Between Systems Thinking and Abstract Thinking Among High School Students Majoring in Electronics. In: Auer, M., Hortsch, H., Sethakul, P. (eds) The Impact of the 4th Industrial Revolution on Engineering Education. ICL 2019. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 1134. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40274-7_52
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40274-7_52
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-40273-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-40274-7
eBook Packages: Intelligent Technologies and RoboticsIntelligent Technologies and Robotics (R0)