The practice-driven teaching reform of building physics is aimed at cultivating green building design capability

Abstract

Facing the increasingly intensified demands for sustainable development in the building sector, traditional building physics teaching exhibits structural limitations in cultivating professionals with integrated green building design capabilities. This study aims to explore a practice-driven reform pathway for building physics teaching, with its goal directly targeting the systematic generation of students' green building design capabilities. The research first analyzes the shortcomings of the traditional knowledge transmission model, and then demonstrates the necessity of transforming the teaching paradigm towards “design thinking integrated with performance thinking.” The core of the reform is built upon three pillars: first, restructuring the course content system, emphasizing climate-responsive methodology, the logic of technical strategy integration, and the transformation mechanism from physical principles to design decisions; second, constructing a simulation and iterative cycle design teaching method, deeply embedding environmental performance simulation into the entire process of design generation and optimization; and third, establishing a dynamic evaluation system based on capability development gradients, using process-based evidence to assess the evolution of students' comprehensive capabilities. This study provides a systematic theoretical framework and an operable implementation plan for shifting building physics teaching from isolated knowledge transmission to integrated capability cultivation.