E-learning as a basis of e-business in AEC

The competence acquisition in Architecture and Engineering in construction is often the result of a self-training in practical experience. Architecture and Engineering in construction pose a complex challenge to an educational system, because either the overwhelming practice and empirical knowledge component, either the high degree of general and specialized competence required. The question is shared by more professional profile in construction, in a context in which learning resources have to match learning demands. The academic education may play a role of knowledge or learning brokers enriching their existing courses through specific innovations in content and delivery. In this paper we will discuss the pedagogical approach in AEC teaching and we will expose how a Construction Management Department of an experimental Virtual School of Architecture, Civil and Environmental Engineering has faced this new methodology fundamented on a Goal and Problem Based Scenarios Tutorial System. The Goal and Problem Based Scenarios Tutoring is a cognitive oriented approach able to integrate the pedagogical issues of the learning by doing approach with cognitive theories that can be effectively supported by multimedia tools. Goal and Problem Based Scenarios Tutorial Systems can be a key teaching tool to reduce the knowledge lack of actual complex process knowledge in AEC.