In the Footsteps of a Professional Software Engineer: Exploring Role-Play in Teaching Software Design

Software design is an inherently abstract field that requires experience to be fully grasped. The considerable variations in how the software industry practices it further contribute to the lack of widely accepted pedagogy or instructions for it. This paper introduces a novel teaching methodology that places students at the heart of real-world software design scenarios. This approach involves simulations that mirror the career progression of software engineers, including the interview process and subsequent professional experiences. Students engage in role-playing exercises, assuming various roles within a company to tackle the practical challenges of scaling and refining a legacy software project. This experience is designed to be immersive by reflecting realistic conditions and responsibilities encountered in the software industry. This paper presents the detailed design of the scenarios and concludes with a detailed reflection on the effectiveness of this method from students' and instructor's perspectives. The results provide valuable insights into the impact of real-world simulations in sparking students' interest in the topic and offer essential guidance for instructing it.