Experts’ consensus on the design of a technical communication module for vocational college students in the manufacturing sector

Abstract

In the twenty-first century one of the most significant challenges is preparing professionals to adequately communicate technical information when writing and speaking. A number of studies have been published on various aspects of technical communication (TC), but few studies in China have investigated the curriculum design for TC. In this study, expert consensus was sought to explore elements required for a TC module for vocational college students in the manufacturing sector using the fuzzy Delphi method (FDM). The FDM was employed to determine consensus among a panel of 12 experts. Two rounds of data collection were conducted to garner opinions from the experts. The first round was semi-structured interviews among five experts to design the items for the FDM questionnaire with a five-point linguistic scale. The designed FDM questionnaire was distributed to 12 experts to gather their opinions on the elements required for the TC module. The data analysis determined the consensus on the elements of the TC module in four categories: objectives, contents, learning activities, and assessment methods. Their levels of agreement were assessed to determine elements that needed to be highlighted for implementation in the classroom. These findings could be used to develop a more relevant instructional module for TC in the manufacturing sector.