Tutorials of Coastal Engineering - 2019

The course on Coastal Engineering is included in the study plan of the master degree program in Civil Engineering (curriculum Off-shore Engineering) at the University of Bologna. The part of course that I am teaching counts 32 hours of lectures. The teacher will make extensive use of interactivity, with the options illustrated below.

Lectures include about 6 hours dedicated to solving exercises by using the personal computer, by collaborative work by students and teacher. Students will be kindly asked to bring their own personal computer to solve the exercises. Students are kindly advised to speak with me if bringing their own personal computer turns out to be not possible.

The purpose of the course is to provide an overview of techniques for preserving and recovering beaches and the shoreline in the presence of human impact. The target of the course is to learn how to design and manage beach and shoreline infrastructures and preservation strategies. The course will focus on the forcing induced by sea waves and the resulting beach morphodynamics; the impact of climate change will be discussed as well as techniques for increasing the resilience of ecosytems.

Interactive learning

The course is included in the project InteractingAcademy@DICAM launched by Department DICAM in 2017 for promoting excellent and innovative teaching methods. InteractingAcademy@DICAM aims to promote teaching methods based on the active participation by students by using innovative technologies and social media. A fundamental role is played by the interaction between students and teachers. The project aims to integrate the traditional one-way flow of knowledge from teacher to student with a feedback flow from student to teacher and a cross flow among students. The target is achieved by assigning an active role to the student during his/her education. Innovative teaching methods may include:

  • Videos of the lectures available online;
  • Short presentations by students;
  • Groups Question&Answers sessions "Challenge the teacher";
  • Self evaluation by students;
  • Interim check of students' opinion on the course.

The teacher will give to the students the option to evaluate their interacting activities as part of their final exam. This is an opportunity to make the evaluation of the student a continuous and interactive process along the semester. For more details on interactive activities see here.

Tutorial documents

The tutorials for the course will be delivered in the form of open web pages, open media and freely accessible videos of all the lectures, for the sake of developing academic education through fully open information. Tutorials will be updated while teaching through collaborative work with the students (see below).

Tutorial web pages for the lectures:

Tutorial web pages for the practical exercises:

Additional tools, like self-evaluation tests and surveys of students' opinion are available on the official Moodle platform of the University of Bologna at this page, that is accessible with student's credentials. Please contact the teacher if you do not have access to this page.

Videos of the lectures

The videos of the lectures are available at the link below: Playlist of Coastal Engineering 2019 Videos will be made available within one week after the lecture.

Calendar of the lectures

The calendar of the lectures is given here below. Please note that changes may occur. Any variation will be communicated by the teacher to the students one week earlier at the latest. If the schedule is not significantly altered the course will terminate around the mid of May. Lectures are delivered in Ravenna, in the "Aula Disegno" at the Ex-Asili, Via Tombesi dell'Ova.

  • Feb 20, 4 hours
  • Feb 27, 4 hours
  • March 6, 4 hours
  • March 20, 4 hours
  • April 3, 4 hours
  • April 17, 4 hours
  • May 8, 4 hours
  • May 15, 4 hours
Exam

Learning outcome will be assessed through an oral examination. The exam typically lasts for about 20-30 minutes and is articulated through 3-4 questions. The student will be given the option to include interactive activities as part of the exam; in this case the duration of the oral examination may be shorter. The teacher may require to provide written response to one question and may ask to develop simple exercises in written form, involving simple calculations. One question aims to assess the ability of the student to deliver a clear and well articulated presentation (this question could be addressed with an interactive activity). Questions are related to the topics that are taught during the lectures and are described in the supporting documents. The teacher may ask questions not directly related to what has been discussed during the lecture in order to assess outstanding capabilities of the student to integrate the notions delivered by the teacher.

The highest score (30/30) is reserved to students who demonstrate a full knowledge of the notions, a very good ability to address questions through an efficient synthesis, and a very good presentation. The laude is reserved to students who demonstrate exceptional motivation and integrate the course content with additional notions by following their personal interest and attitude.

The teacher is available for a first pre-exam as soon as the lecture are finished. 3 official exam dates will be scheduled from the official closure of lecture until the end of July. Exam dates will be fixed in agreement with the students by the first week of April.

Contact details of the teacher and individual clarifications

The teacher is available to provide clarifications on request, by receiving individual students or groups. Teacher can be contacted by email and will receive students after the lectures.