WJEC Vocational Award Engineering Level 1/2

Communicating Design Ideas In this chapter you are going to: ➜ Learn about the need to communicate engineering information using • appropriate language (technical or otherwise) • structured methods of presentation • verbal and non-verbal methods • 2D and 3D approaches of communication. This chapter will cover the following areas of theWJEC specification: Unit 1 LO2 Be able to communicate design solutions AC2.2 Communicate design ideas Communicate: convey meaning using appropriate language; logical structure; presentation of information; clarity of language and presentation; use of appropriate terminology; audiences (Engineers, non-Engineers); use of visual support, e.g. mock-ups, CAD 2 Introduction It is an Engineer’s responsibility to communicate ideas, solutions and project-related issues to different groups of people such as colleagues who could work on the project with you, clients that have given you the brief and asked for your services, or customers that will eventually purchase/use your proposed solution. Quite often it is the client or customer that is paying for the project and they will need to understand the engineered solutions before giving their approval and allowing the project to go ahead. Customers and clients would not be able to understand a lot of the language used by Engineers due to the technical nature of the terminology used in the subject area. It is vital, therefore, that Engineers learn and use a series of communicative skills that allow them to convey meaning with clarity and transparency to different groups of people. We can categorise these various groups of people in two ways: • Engineers and • non-Engineers . Do you think Engineers need to communicate differently from non-Engineers? Do you think non-Engineers would understand the technical language Engineers use? Write a list of as many new ‘engineering’ words or phrases you have already learnt after only one chapter . As you complete this task, ask yourself ‘would any of my non-Engineer friends or family understand these words and what they mean?’ Task 2.1 34