Application of Sustainable Development of Teaching in Engineering Education: A Case Study of Undergraduate Course Design of Raman Spectroscopy Based on Virtual Reality (VR) Technology

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Overall assessment

The application of VR technology to the field of education is not new, but still many problems need to be improved.

The structure of the article is relatively rigorous, and the methodology used is more appropriate.

 

Comments and Suggestions

It is necessary to illustrate the findings of this study, how can the sustainable development of engineering education be achieved?

 

In section 2.5.: It is recommended that the authors explain the intention of using these three assessment methods? There is no need to explain what these 3 methods are.

 

The very detailed content of chapter III is encouraging. However, explaining these areas may not take much ink, in other words, the authors can first explain the current state of the relevant fields, and what improvements may be made after using VR technology. After a moderate discussion, it is enough to present the main points in a table, which will make the article less verbose.

 

The authors provided some analysis of the feedback given by the students. However, they are also essential for students who are opposed, or who have not been exposed to VR technology because of objective constraints. For this group of students, they may be at a disadvantage in their future education. Do the authors have a response to this? Meanwhile, have you learned more about their thinking?

 

Is the first expert listed in Table 3 just the same name as one of the authors? Or are they the same person? Self-commentary may not be appropriate. Do these experts have a conflict of interest with this study? Additionally, it is recommended that the experts invited be mainly professors or associate professors.

 

 

Minor issues

The courses mentioned by the author in the article refer to 1 course or 10 courses? The discrepancy is inconsistent, which needs to be double-checked.

 

The format of the references does not meet the requirements of the journal.

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 1:

 

Thanks for your precious time and constructive comments on our paper. The paper is revised according to your comments. The following is the answers and revisions we have made in response to the questions and suggestions on an item by item basis.

 

1. It is necessary to illustrate the findings of this study, how can the sustainable development of engineering education be achieved?

 

This paper analyzes the method of realizing the sustainable development of engineering education with the case of Raman spectroscopy undergraduate course design of VR technology. In the research, we focused on the way to improve the traditional teaching mode by combining interdisciplinary technology, that is, combining the teaching mode of VR technology, and explored the potential of applying emerging technologies to improve the teaching mode. At the same time, we have established a feedback evaluation system to objectively evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of the methods, including questionnaires, interviews and peer reviews, and then improve the curriculum design according to the feedback. As mentioned in the fifth conclusion of Chapter V, the education reform model will form a closed loop of sustainable improvement through the above methods.

 

2. In section 2.5.: It is recommended that the authors explain the intention of using these three assessment methods? There is no need to explain what these 3 methods are.

 

As you suggested, we have added the intention of using these three assessment methods, and have deleted redundant explanations of these methods. Firstly, the questionnaire survey analyzes the actual situation of the course from three aspects: course overview, implementation effect, characteristics and problems. Then, the purpose of the interview is to comprehensively understand the students' subjective feelings and evaluation of the VR course. Finally, peer review is to improve the whole evaluation system and make it professional and authoritative.

 

3. The very detailed content of chapter III is encouraging. However, explaining these areas may not take much ink, in other words, the authors can first explain the current state of the relevant fields, and what improvements may be made after using VR technology. After a moderate discussion, it is enough to present the main points in a table, which will make the article less verbose.

 

Thank you for the suggestion, we have simplified its contents for chapter III of the manuscript. For each content, we have given a brief introduction, and pointed out the advantages of combining VR technology. We have added in Chapter IV a discussion of the advantages and challenges of VR technology and showed them in Table 3.

 

4. The authors provided some analysis of the feedback given by the students. However, they are also essential for students who are opposed, or who have not been exposed to VR technology because of objective constraints. For this group of students, they may be at a disadvantage in their future education. Do the authors have a response to this? Meanwhile, have you learned more about their thinking?

 

Thank you for your question. We have made a supplementary discussion on Section 4.2. In the interview with the students, we learned about all the students' ideas, and we designed the conversation to understand all the students' views on VR courses (the results of the conversation were analyzed in Section 4.2 of the manuscript). Students who have not been exposed to VR technology may be at a disadvantage in their future education. Because technology is constantly improving, people need to constantly adapt to the changes brought about by new technologies, and most people who cannot adapt to changes will be eliminated by the times. Therefore, it is essential to cultivate students' ability to adapt to and accept new technologies in teaching.

 

5. Is the first expert listed in Table 3 just the same name as one of the authors? Or are they the same person? Self-commentary may not be appropriate. Do these experts have a conflict of interest with this study? Additionally, it is recommended that the experts invited be mainly professors or associate professors.

 

As you suggested, we have updated the results in Table 4. We have invited another professor Liangquan Ge, who has the same major as Professor Guoqiang Zeng, to conduct a peer review to avoid self-commentary. At the same time, you suggest that the experts invited should be mainly professors or associate professors, so we have changed lecturer Peiyan Luo to another associate professor (Zhixing Gu) of the same major.

 

6. The courses mentioned by the author in the article refer to 1 course or 10 courses? The discrepancy is inconsistent, which needs to be double-checked.

 

We are very sorry for the confusion. Raman spectroscopy is one professional undergraduate course of spectroscopy. We have designed 10 contents for this course, namely Chapter 3 of the manuscript. These contents are included in the Raman spectroscopy course. You can see Table 2 for specific class hour arrangement.

 

7. The format of the references does not meet the requirements of the journal.

 

Thank you for your suggestion. We have adjusted the format of all the references in this manuscript according to the format of the references in Sustainability.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

In my opinion, the topic of the study is interesting. Although it is important to note that the abstract does not adequately describe the objective of the article, does not explain the methodology, does not show the most relevant results, does not specify the strengths and limitations of the research. The scientific language should be revised, in line 21 the sentence is in the first person. The abstract should be reviewed and corrected.

The manuscript is clear, relevant to the field of study and is written in a structured way. The article shows a scientific approach in line with the IMRYD format. In terms of the theoretical framework, the topic of the study is well justified, and the relevance of the study is well stated. The bibliography includes relevant and up-to-date references (although some references from 2019 onwards should be added), in the field of study, all references cited in the main text are included in the references section.

The paper provides an exhaustive description of the work activities and resources used including methodologies, techniques and tools. However, it is necessary to point out that the methodology used is confusing and it should be revised carefully. In addition, the research procedure (from the methodological approach to the data analysis planning and the evaluation of the obtained results) must be explained in detail before subsection 2.1 (line 100). If authors include these issues, the paper will be improved in organisation, coherence and clarity. Graphs and tables included in the paper are useful for understanding the obtained results.

In the discussion, it would be relevant to add a section including the research strengths and their limitations. The conclusions are presented in coherent way according to the  proposed objectives covering the main findings reached after the analysis of the obtained results.

The topic of the study is current and well defined. It is argued with updated bibliographical references, although some should be added from 2019 onwards (24 of the 49 citations are published in the last 6 years).

In my opinion this article is suitable for publication in the journal after the following changes will be included in the revised version of the paper:
- Complete the abstract.
- Check grammar and scientific language.

- A deep description, analysis and discussion of the key aspects of the research process.
- Complete the results and discussion section with the strengths and limitations of the study.

-Add some reference from 2019 onwards.

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 2:

 

Thanks for your precious time and constructive comments on our paper. The paper is revised according to your comments. The following is the answers and revisions we have made in response to the questions and suggestions on an item by item basis.

 

1. Complete the abstract.

 

As you suggested, we have refined the abstract of the manuscript. We have supplemented the purpose of the article and explain the interpretation methods used. In addition, the advantages and limitations of the most relevant results and studies have been supplemented.

 

2. Check grammar and scientific language.

 

As you suggested, we have checked the scientific language of the manuscript to avoid the first person.

 

3. A deep description, analysis and discussion of the key aspects of the research process.

 

As you suggested, we have made changes to Chapter II. The content of Chapter II is a detailed explication of the research process of the manuscript. VR technology, computational thinking and immersive learning are technical supports. The mainstream Raman spectrometer in the market is the basis of VR experiment design of the course. Raman Spectroscopy course design is completed according to comprehensively consideration, which contains the requirements and training objectives of the course, as well as the technologies and materials that the course depends on. Finally, the feedback obtained through the evaluation makes continuous improvement on the curriculum.

 

4. Complete the results and discussion section with the strengths and limitations of the study.

 

As you suggested, we have added the strengths and limitations of the study to Chapter IV. In Section 4.1, we have discussed the advantages and challenges of VR-based courses in detail. It is summarized in Table 3.

 

5. Add some reference from 2019 onwards.

 

As you suggested, we have updated the references. We have investigated the literature in the field of Raman spectroscopy in recent years, and modified Chapter III of the manuscript to ensure advancement.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The author demonstrates a solid loop of curriculum reform of Raman spectroscopy and brings VR technology into the teaching. Also, this course was evaluated and improved through a feedback mechanism. I recommend this manuscript can be accepted after addressing the following questions/suggestions:

 

1. The course content focuses more on applications than the physical aspects. I suggest adding more information deep into the physical principle.
2. It is essential to discuss the limitation of Raman spectroscopy and compared it with other spectroscopic technologies.

 

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 3:

 

Thanks for your precious time and constructive comments on our paper. The paper is revised according to your comments. The following is the answers and revisions we have made in response to the questions and suggestions on an item by item basis.

 

1. The course content focuses more on applications than the physical aspects. I suggest adding more information deep into the physical principle.

 

As you suggested, we present the physical principles through specific application cases in the course content ( 3.1 to 3.5 and 3.7 ), and the experimental content is closely related to the principle of Raman spectroscopy. We have arranged a class hour of Introduction, in which we will give a preliminary explanation of the principle of Raman spectroscopy. The ten subheadings in Chapter 3 may be misleading. In fact, abstract physical principles are displayed to students through specific applications combined with VR classrooms to obtain better teaching results.

 

2. It is essential to discuss the limitation of Raman spectroscopy and compared it with other spectroscopic technologies.

 

According to your suggestion, we added different spectroscopic methods in Section 3.4 and 3.6 to compare with Raman spectroscopy and analyze the advantages and disadvantages of Raman spectroscopy.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

About comment 4: The authors said: “Students who have not been exposed to VR technology may be at a disadvantage in their future education. Because technology is constantly improving, people need to constantly adapt to the changes brought about by new technologies, and most people who cannot adapt to changes will be eliminated by the times. Therefore, it is essential to cultivate students’ ability to adapt to and accept new technologies in teaching.”

This is true, but there probably shouldn’t be such a bias for educators. For example, there will definitely be some students who cannot access VR due to objective conditions. This should not be an obstacle. They deserve the same attention from their teachers as other students who have been exposed to new technologies like VR. Thus, it may not be easy to achieve sustainable development of engineering education.

 

About comment 5: It is not clear whether the 2 experts re-identified by the authors were fully aware of the study? If they don’t know enough about this study, then this is not appropriate. At the same time, do these experts have a conflict of interest with the authors? These problems have not been properly addressed.

 

Although the authors proofread the format of the references, they were still not standardized, perhaps because the authors did not have enough time.

The abstract is too long (no more than 200 words) and it needs to be revised.

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper is suitable for publication in its current form.