Improvement of IT Students’ Communication Skills using Project

Based Learning

Chikako Morimoto

Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo, Japany

Keywords: Communication Skills, Project Based Learning, Practical Education.

Abstract: It is well known that communication skills are important in business. In recent decades, diversity has been

becoming a big trend among Japanese companies. As a result, a high level of communication skills is

required of employees. The mainstream information technology (IT) industry is shifting focus from

software development to providing software “services.” IT companies need to communicate with their

clients to understand the clients’ IT strategies. However, typically, IT engineers are not seen as having good

communication skills. There is a similar impression of IT students. In this study, we compared

communication skills of IT students and non-IT students. Then, we compared communication skills of the

IT students before and after participating in project-based learning (PBL). As a result, we found that PBL is

effective in improving the communication skills of IT students.

1 INTRODUCTION

The information technology industry in Japan today

must pay attention to “communication skills” as

many companies in the IT industry are shifting focus

from development of software products to providing

software services. Japanese IT companies need to

communicate with their clients to understand the

clients’ IT strategies. Therefore, IT companies

require their IT engineers to have both IT skills and

human skills, which include high-level

communication skills. However, typically, IT

engineers are not seen as having good

communication skills. There is a similar impression

of IT students as well.

It is well known that communication skills are

important. In recent decades, as diversity has been

becoming a big trend among Japanese companies,

high-level communication skills are required of

employees. However, the meaning of

“communication skills” is different in each business

situation. As a result, we identified a need to analyze

the structure of communication skills and look for

ways to improve it.

In Japanese education, Project-Based Learning

(PBL) has attracted great attention. PBL is a

comprehensive approach to classroom teaching and

learning that is designed to engage students in the

investigation of authentic problems (Ayas and

Zeniuk, 2001). In this study, we made two

comparisons. One is the difference in

communication skills between IT students and non-

IT students. The other is the improvement of IT

students’ communication skills before and after the

application of PBL.

2 RELATED STUDY

This section explores the two topics important to our

study: PBL and communication skills.

2.1 PBL

The education method of PBL is increasingly being

used worldwide.

2.1.1 PBL in Engineering Education

In the 1950s, engineering education was “chalk and

talk,” in which a teacher lectured and students were

mostly passive listeners (Mills, Treagust, 2003). But

as the social environment became more complex and

diverse, engineering graduates were required to have

stronger communication and teamwork skills. To

address these types of requirements, new education

Morimoto, C.

Improvement of IT Students’ Communication Skills using Project Based Learning.

In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU 2016) - Volume 2, pages 147-152

ISBN: 978-989-758-179-3

147

methods were proposed as a solution in the U.S., the

UK, and Australia.

One curriculum was “problem-based” learning.

This method has been used for professional medical

training in the U.S. since the 1960s. In problem-

based learning, students learn how to cope with real

problems through structured presentation of problem

situations. This methodology has been extended to

engineering programs and has been seen as effective

in improving problem-solving and communication

skills. However, engineering students needed more

teamwork skills than medical students, and “project-

based” learning, emerged (Blumenfeld et al. 1991, S.

Bell 2010).

Heitmann described the difference between

problem-based learning and project-based learning

(Heitmann, 1996) as follows. He said that the

“project” is the engineer’s workplace. So, project-

based learning is a good fit to learning engineering

in a practical manner. Project-based learning can

include problem-based learning, and it may be

defined in various ways by different educational

disciplines and levels. Project-based learning has

become a major part of the engineering curriculum

(Mills, Treagust, 2003).

The “Capstone Education Program” (A J. Dutson

et al. 1997) is a famous style of problem-based and

project-based learning. It is an experiential learning

activity in which the analytical knowledge gained

from previous courses is joined with the practice of

engineering. It is a popular program in the U.S., and

there are many examples of the Capstone Program in

many universities. The distinguishing feature of

“Capstone education” is that it deals with social

issues. Companies and universities design a project

together and students learn to solve a problem

through a project.

2.1.2 PBL in Japanese IT Engineering

Education

For over 14 years, in Japan, companies have

identified communication skills as the most

important skill required of an individual to be hired

as a new employee. Engineering students are

graduating with good knowledge of fundamental

engineering science and computer literacy, but they

often do not know how to apply that in practice

because they lack experience in teamwork. With this

concern, PBL is increasing in Japan. For example,

the number of papers about PBL in Engineering

Education Magazine doubled to 22 items in 2014

from 10 in 2006.

The IT industry also requires strong

communication and teamwork skills. As one

solution, in 2006, the Ministry of Education, Culture,

Sports, Science and Technology in Japan (MEXT)

introduced a new IT training curriculum for graduate

schools’ computer science departments (MEXT

2005) to establish a nationwide practical education

network for IT human resources development. The

curriculum requires using “project-based learning.”

By using PBL, the IT industry expects IT students to

acquire both software development project

experience and communication skills.

2.2 Communication Skills

This section introduces communication skills.

2.2.1 Structure of Communication

The communication process has many sequential

steps: getting thoughts, encoding, sending, receiving,

decoding, and understanding (see Figure1). Each

step uses distinct skills, but generally, the term

“communication skills” is used.

Figure 1: Communication steps.

Katz said communication skills were important

for all managers including top executive and

foremen (Katz, 1955). His skill model is accepted

widely by Japanese business organizations;

however, he did not explain in detail what skills are

included in communication skills.

2.2.2 Index of Communication Skills

Fujimoto and Daibo investigated a factor pattern of

ENDCOREs (Fujimoto, Daibo, 2007), defining the

scale of communication skills. They examined

psychology students and found six categories of

factors: expressivity, assertiveness, deciphering

ability, other acceptance, self-control, and regulation

of interpersonal relationships. According to their

survey, Japanese students are better at “reaction

skills” than “expression skills.” However, these

indices did not test students in other majors.

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The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry in

Japan (METI) has defined basic social skills. In

basic social skills, communication skills are not

clearly defined; communication skills are separated

into “general social skills,” “active speaking skills,”

“active listening skills,” and so on.

2.2.3 Research Question

Our research question was to determine whether

PBL is effective in improving communication skills

for IT students. We tried to determine the difference

in communication skills between IT students and

non-IT students. Then, we compared the effect of

PBL and other school activities on the students.

3 RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS

We used two questionnaires to gather our research.

3.1 Study 1: IT Students and Non-IT

Students

First, we compared the communication skills of the

IT students with those of the non-IT students using

paper questionnaires.

3.1.1 Research Outline

Our research outline was as follows:

We chose three groups to compare their project

experience and their communication skills.

Group A comprised our main research target. It

was composed of 29 IT students in a graduate

computer science course. All of them were male and

22–23 years old.

Group B was composed of 66 undergraduate

non-IT students who were learning project

management. In Group B, 7 students were female

and 59 were male, and they were 18–19 years old.

They had project experience.

Group C was also composed of 58 undergraduate

non-IT students, of which four students were female

and 54 were male. They were 18–19 years old. They

were studying finance and did not have project

experience.

Our questionnaires consisted of ENDCOREs and

the Basic Social Skills indicators. We chose 16

questions (Table 1 and Table 2). The attitude of

politeness is included in general skills.

We used anonymous questionnaires. The

questions were categorized into “importance” and

“execution.” The respondents were to indicate

whether they thought the skill or trait was important

and then also whether they thought that they

“executed” (personally possessed the skill or

portrayed the trait). Each question required ranking

the response from 1–5 with 5 being the highest and 1

being the lowest.

Table 1: The question category for research 1.

Question Category Number of question

General skill (G) 3

Deliver message (D) 3

Active listening (AL) 3

Polite leadership (P) 3

Assertiveness (AS) 4

Table 2: The questions.

** Question

G If I am having a trouble, I consult a friend.

G I gather everyone’s opinion during the discussion

and then I make a conclusion.

G I usually behave politely.

D When I talk with other people, I pay attention to

their level of understanding.

D Before I talk with them, I organize my thoughts

first.

D When I write to other people, I consider their

level of understanding.

AL In the conversation, I look at my partner's face or

eyes as much as possible.

AL In the conversation, I nod and react.

AL In the conversation, I confirm my understanding

by asking suitable questions.

P When there are different opinions, I listen to them

carefully and think how to convince them with

my opinion.

P When there are different opinions, I listen and

respect them.

P In front of many people, I can say my thoughts.

AS I can take the initiative of conversations.

AS Without being influenced by other opinions, I can

insist mine.

AS To lead the conversation, I can easily adjust to

others’ attitude.

AS I can insist logically and in a concreate way.

** Category

Because of the small sample size, we analysed

each group without dividing by gender and age

groups.

3.1.2 Result

In the three groups, there were slight differences.

There was no significant statistical difference, but

there was a difference in mean values. Group A said

that “deliver message” was the most important skill

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and the next most important skills were “polite

leadership” and “assertiveness.” Group B identified

“polite leadership” and “assertiveness” as the most

important. Group C answered “general skills,”

“polite leadership,” and “assertiveness” as the most

important. Tables 3–5 show the answers as

“important,” “executed,” and “not executed.” An “x”

shows the category that they selected the most.

Table 3: The answer of each group (important).

Category

G D AL P AS

A * x xx x

B * xx x

C * xx xx

It seemed that Group A focused more on “deliver

message” than on “active listening,” while Group B

focused on “active listening.” All groups thought

that “polite leadership” and “assertiveness” were

important, but they did not execute these traits.

Group A answered that they did not feel free to

consult their friends, but Group B and Group C

answered that they could do it. Group A felt that it

was difficult to look into other people's eyes and to

understand their reactions. Group B and Group C

could look at others and could understand their

reactions easily.

3.1.3 Analysis

From each answer, it seemed that all groups thought

that a polite attitude was important, and they tried to

act politely. They said that it was difficult to show

assertiveness and take leadership. These are all

typical Japanese attitudes.

The biggest difference between the IT-students

(Group A) and the project management students

(Group B) was listening attitude. IT students seemed

to push their own thoughts and opinions, but project

management students listened to others’ thoughts

carefully. We think that is one reason why IT

students seem poor at communication.

3.2 Study 2: before and after PBL

In the second study, we compared the

communication skills of IT students before and after

administering a PBL program. We administered

PBL for a full year and the students could take the

PBL course voluntarily. It was also possible to retire

from PBL in the middle of the year.

3.2.1 Research Outline

We surveyed how much the IT students’

communication skills improved, using a

questionnaire before and after PBL. Our research

outline was as follows:

Our questionnaires consisted of the same

indicators used in Study 1: the ENDCOREs and the

Basic Social Skills indicators. The respondents were

24 graduate students in a computer science course.

All of them were male, 22–23 years old and in the

first year of the master’s program. They were

surveyed in April 2014 and January 2015.

In our PBL program, the students developed the

Android mobile application software and server

application software using AWS and NEXUS7.

Each team consisted of 5–7 members. They started

PBL on April 2014 and ended in January 2015. The

aim of the PBL program was to learn software

development and learn project management through

trial and error. The PBL class met once a week for 3

hours per class. However, the students also needed

to work additional hours and plan their own team

schedule. Figure 2 shows their standard annual

schedule. Some of the students were good at Java

programing, and some of them were not. They

needed to take lessons in addition to the PBL class,

including an Android development class. It is

standard for master’s students in Japan to participate

in the seminar. They also participate in an internship

during summer vacation and do additional study for

their research.

We needed to compare before and after PBL, so

we used assigned questionnaires. We asked the same

questions from the standpoint of “importance” and

“execution.” Each question required different levels

with 4 being the highest and 1 being the lowest. In

addition, we asked for their opinion regarding the

effectiveness of PBL on a 5-level scale with 5 being

the highest and 1 being the lowest.

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Figure 2: A standard annual schedule of PBL.

3.2.2 Result

In this section, we explain the results. There was a

change in the skill level of the students’

communication skills before and after PBL.

Overall, “importance” received higher scores

than “execution.” The respondents seemed to

understand that communication skills are important,

but felt that they did not execute them enough. This

trend was the same both before and after PBL.

However, their communication skills scores

improved after PBL.

Table 6 shows the result of the question: “Do

you think that PBL was effective for your

communication skill improvement?” We saw that

74.8% students answered that PBL was effective in

improving their communication skills.

Table 6: Effectiveness of PBL.

In a free answer column, some students wrote

that they thought that PBL was very effective in

keeping up their motivation for learning and that it

was effective in improving their social skills. One

student said that he made some friends through PBL.

In the next step, we analyzed each category.

According to the category evaluation, the most

important skills before PBL was “deliver message”

and the least important skill was “active listening.”

At first, their interest lay in the output of their own

thoughts, but after PBL their interest changed.

After PBL, the score in all categories improved.

The most executed skill was “deliver message,” and

the most unexecuted skill was “polite leadership.”

Particularly, the improvement of “active listening”

was statistically significant. The other scores were

not statistically significant. Table 7 shows the

difference in the execution score before and after

PBL, and also shows the result of the T-test.

Table 7: The difference of execution.

We considered each question. Before PBL, the

respondents said that the following two statements

were the most important skills: “When I talk with

other people, I pay attention to their level of

understanding” and “I gather everyone’s opinion

during the discussion, and then I make a conclusion.”

However, each respondent said that they did not

think they executed them enough. After PBL, all

skills improved. The improvements in these skills

were statistically significant in the T-test as follows:

“ If I am having a problem, I consult a

friend.”(p=0.035)

“ I gather everyone’s opinion during the

discussion, and then I make a conclusion.”(p=0.009)

“When I talk with other people, I pay attention

to their level of understanding.”(p=0.004)

“ In the conversation, I confirm my

understanding by asking suitable

questions.”(p=0.005)

“When there are different opinions, I listen to

them carefully and think how to convince them with

my opinion.”(p=0.000)

3.2.3 Analysis

PBL appeared to be effective in improving the

communication skills of IT students.

Their interest seemed to change from a focus on

the output of their thoughts to listening to others’

thoughts. These results were similar to the trend

among project management students in Study 1.

Earlier, they placed themselves in the center of

their communication. However, after PBL, they

placed others in the center of their communication.

We think this is a significant change.

4 CONCLUSIONS

In this study, we surveyed the communication skills

Ef f e ctivenessofPBL Answer

Stronglyagree 5

Agr ee 13

Soso 6

Notag r ee 0

Stronglynotag ree 0

Skill Bef ore After T‐test(p)

Generalskill 2.60 2.83 0.033795034

Delivermessage 2.76 3.04 0.018403696

Activelistening 2.65 3.03 0.00098705 *

Politelyleader s hip 2.51 2.74 0.065603211

Assertiveness 2.53 2.72 0.051826543

*>0.01

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151

of graduate IT students. In the first study, we

compared the communication skills of IT students

and non-IT students. As a result, we found that the

project management students paid attention to others

in their communication. In addition, we found that

IT students were not good at listening to others.

They seemed to focus on output during

communication.

In the second study, we compared the

communication skills of IT students before and after

they participated in a PBL program.. As a result, we

found that PBL was effective in improving their

communication skills. Particularly, “active listening”

was improved.

We used self-questionnaires, and acknowledge

that it can be difficult for respondents to subjectively

judge their own communication skills. Also, besides

the PBL program, other factors could influence the

respondents, such as their seminars, internships, and

other school activities. However, we still think that

PBL is an effective training method to improve

communication skills.

IT students like to communicate using online

tools such as Twitter and Slack. But to improve their

communication skills, it is necessary for them to

communicate with other people directly. We think

that IT students can learn teamwork and interactive

communication with other people through PBL.

Our future plans for study are as follows: 1)

analyse the data in detail and 2) find exactly what

skills are improved most effectively using PBL.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This research study received a grant from the

Nomura School of Advanced Management.

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