PTBL: A Learning Model Based on PBL and TBL for Training Soft Skills Supported by 3D Virtual Pedagogical Platform(3DVPP)

With software projects are becoming increasingly complicated, soft skills such as collaboration, effective communication, rhetoric, socio-cultural, accountabilities and collision resolution in real-life software projects, as well as computer programming are badly required for team members to cooperate and finish the strenuous projects. Therefore it is fundamental for software engineering students to improve such skills, if they want to accelerate the success of teamwork. Nowadays, the ability of effective cooperation and communication is much more important than raw programming talent. Teams with average programmers who communicate well are more likely to success than those with superstars but not good at communication. At the same time, these soft skills are just difficult to teach and learn which require true collaboration and communication between students. The traditional learning activities for training soft skills are insufficient based on the facts that teachers and mentors pay too much attention on professional and technical abilities instead of soft skills. In this paper, a novel learning model called Problem and Task Based Learning is proposed which includes Problem-Based Learning, Task-Based Learning, and Web3D technologies. This new model could elevate the teamwork skills in software engineering and overcome the common limitations of the traditional course. This paper also presents two courses using this learning model-a Task-game course and a virtual 3D meeting, as well as some experimental results obtained from the students and the teachers who have participated in the two case studies. Both students and teachers are from Software Engineering Department of Tsinghua University.