Mechanistic Reasoning and Ethics of Caring in Engineering Contexts for Educators

Contexts of introductory engineering education hold potential to situate engineering within the cultural and sociotechnical dimensions of being and becoming, thus highlighting the transformative roles of engineering. In this paper, we pursue an articulation of care as a key learning outcome for preservice teachers in their first formal experiences in engineering disciplines. We present two explanatory themes, originating from (1) an extended bridge design task and (2) an investigation of machine learning image recognition processes. In both studies, preservice teachers engage in a process through which mechanistic explanations about sociotechnical systems give rise to an ethic of care (Silvis et al., 2022), narrowing the relational distance among the engineering contexts, themselves, and perceptions of students. We highlight affective connections between undergraduates' experiences in engineering and their trajectories of becoming teachers and explain how mechanistic sensemaking supported articulations of an ethic of caring concerning both engineering and learners.