Engineering for Sustainable Development: A Smart Pedagogical Framework for Developing IoT Projects Applied to Climate Action – Practices and Challenges

Abstract

To promote UNESCO’s Sustainable Development Global Goals (SDGs) in Higher Education and document a set of good practices emerging from the construction of Arduino Internet of Things (IoT) projects, particularly as contributions to climate action (SDG 13), authors followed the three-stage design-based methodology. Thus, a conceptual framework was designed and aligned with an educational scenario. The framework was orchestrated with the principles of smart pedagogy aiming at smart learning. Accordingly, an e-lab was developed, incorporating technological platforms/tools, and was delivered as an e-course lab to 67 tertiary education student engineers. Finally, data were collected and analyzed by a Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) data analysis. From the findings (Strengths), authors concluded to a set of strategies that could be used as good practices, emerged from the construction of IoT projects when they are aligned with smart pedagogical frameworks’ guidelines. However, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats were considered as challenges and thus an impetus for refinement and redesign.