A New Transdisciplinary Approach to Foster Soft Skills in Engineering : Using Critical Reading Micro-Workshops

International reports presented in recent years insist on the need to develop soft skills to a greater degree considering the future jobs required to address the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The biggest problem arises with two of those competences in particular: Critical Thinking and Creativity, given the difficulty of their enhancement using the logical-scientific approach traditionally used in engineering programs. That implies the need to consider disruptive innovations in teaching-learning approaches. In this study, research was conducted to verify the relationship between a mixed infusion-immersion implementation of an artistic-narrative approach and the development of these two soft skills. The results showed that, using the same stimulus path that metacognitive tools of the artistic process provoke, is a very efficient way to naturally develop soft skills in Generation Z students. Critical Reading MicroWorkshops were implemented into classroom activities involving a Critical Reading framework. The results obtained corroborate the significant influence that the new approach had to foster Critical Thinking and Creativity in engineering students.