Teaching Empirical Methods at Eindhoven University of Technology

TL;DR

This paper reports on the design, challenges, and lessons learned from teaching a master course on empirical research methods at Eindhoven University of Technology, combining practical and exam-based assessments.

Contribution

It provides an experience report detailing effective strategies and insights for teaching empirical research methods in a diverse student environment.

Findings

Identified key challenges in teaching research methods.

Developed effective course design strategies.

Shared lessons learned for future course iterations.

Abstract

In this chapter, we share an experience report of teaching a master course on empirical research methods at Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands. The course is taught for ten weeks to a mix of students from different study programs and combines both practical assignments with a closed-book exam. We discuss the challenges of teaching a course on research methods and explain how we address these challenges in the course design. Additionally, we share our lessons learned and the do's and don'ts we learned over several iterations of teaching the course.