Effectiveness of Using MyFPGA Platform for Teaching Digital Logic

Accompanying electric circuits and computer programming, digital logic is deemed one of the most essential parts of any Electrical and Computer Engineering curriculum, so student success in the course is critical. Furthermore, research shows that the academic performance of students is heavily dependent upon student engagement, which is believed to increase with classroom strategies such as flipped-classrooms, cooperative learning, project-based learning, and virtual labs. The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) is a Hispanic serving institution with distributive campuses, where many of the students work part-time. With consideration of the special needs of our students and the latest developments in engineering education, this study focuses on our recent experience of teaching digital logical using MyFPGA, online FPGA platform. We first introduce the MyFPGA platform in this paper. Developed by one of the authors of this paper, this web-based design features I/O interfacing circuits with an Intel FPGA hardware board as well as API web services with the Intel Quartus II design software. The platform provides 24/7 real-time hardware design experience at students’ fingertips, requiring only a web browser and internet access. It exposes the students to a complete engineering design cycle that includes problem specification, block diagram design, HDL source code design, simulation and hardware verification, trouble shooting and evaluation, and reporting. We consider different cases of the platform usage in two digital logic courses. To evaluate the effectiveness of the student learning experience, data is collected using outcome assessments, student feedback and self-evaluations, instructor observations, and comparative studies. Preliminary results confirmed the effectiveness of the online digital design platform. We have also identified a few pitfalls, such as instructors’ initial reluctance in adopting the platform and students’ first perception of the platform as a pure simulation tool. Based on the studies, recommendations are made to identify the best practices in the utilization of the platform to better serve Electrical and Computer Engineering majors and secondary school students interested in the general STEM fields

Integration of Multimedia Interactive Web Tools with In-Class Active Learning

In this paper, we present our experience with an introduction to engineering course in which we used a combination of active and collaborative teaching methods, multimedia web-based material, and web-based interactive tools. The students were engaged in active learning in class with methods such as demonstrations, hands-on work, and group work. After class, the students used the web-based material that we developed, such as multiple choice quizzes, interactive applets, and animations. We have also developed a number of web-based course management tools that were used by the course instructors. We conclude that both the students and instructors had a very positive experience from using this combination of methods

Evaluating groupware support for software engineering students

Software engineering tasks, during both development and maintenance, typically involve teamwork using computers. Team members rarely work on isolated computers. An underlying assumption of our research is that software engineering teams will work more effectively if adequately supported by network-based groupware technology. Experience of working with groupware and evaluating groupware systems will also give software engineering students a direct appreciation of the requirements of engineering such systems. This research is investigating the provision of such network-based support for software engineering students and the impact these tools have on their groupwork. We will first describe our experiences gained through the introduction of an asynchronous virtual environment ­ SEGWorld to support groupwork during the Software Engineering Group (SEG) project undertaken by all second year undergraduates within the Department of Computer Science. Secondly we will describe our Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) module which has been introduced into the students' final year of study as a direct result of our experience with SEG, and in particular its role within Software Engineering. Within this CSCW module the students have had the opportunity to evaluate various groupware tools. This has enabled them to take a retrospective view of their experience of SEGWorld and its underlying system, BSCW, one year on. We report our findings for SEG in the form of a discussion of the hypotheses we formulated on how the SEGs would use SEGWorld, and present an initial qualitative assessment of student feedback from the CSCW module

The global hydrology education resource

This article is a selective overview of a range of contemporary teaching resources currently available globally for university hydrology educators, with an emphasis on web-based resources. Major governmental and scientific organizations relevant to the promotion of hydrology teaching are briefly introduced. Selected online teaching materials are then overviewed, i.e. PowerPoint presentations, course materials, and multimedia. A range of websites offering free basic hydrology modelling software are mentioned, together with some data file sources which could be used for teaching. Websites offering a considerable range of general hydrology links are also noted, as are websites providing international and national data sets which might be incorporated into teaching exercises. Finally, some discussion is given on reference material for different modes of hydrology teaching, including laboratory and field exercises

Strategies and mechanisms for electronic peer review

This journal article published at the October 2000 Frontiers in Education Conference discusses strategies and mechanisms for electronic peer review. It outlines a peer-grading system for review of student assignments over the World-Wide Web called Peer Grader. The system allows authors and reviewers to communicate and authors to update their submissions. This system facilitates collaborative learning and makes it possible to break up a large project into smaller portions. The article summarizes a unique and innovative method of peer-review. Educational levels: Graduate or professional

Using Shared Workspaces in Higher Education

We evaluate the use of BSCW shared workspaces in higher education by means of a comparison of seven courses in which this environment was used. We identify a number of different functions for which the BSCW environment has been used and discuss the relative success of these functions across the cases. In addition, we evaluate the cases with the 4E model of Collis et al. (2000) which predicts the chances of acceptance of ICT in an educational setting. Effectiveness for the given task appears to be a prime success factor for using ICT. But an effective tool may fail due to other factors like ease of use and organisational, socialcultural or technological obstacles. The particular strength of a shared workspace, for which BSCW is most effective and efficient, is providing a repository for objects of collaborative work. Other types of usage showed mixed results. In the future we expect that learning takes place in an integrated, open ICT environment in which different kinds of tools are available for different purposes and users can switch between tools as appropriate. We could observe this in several of the case studies, where non-use of BSCW did not mean that a particular task was not performed, but, on the contrary, a more efficient solution for the same function was available. Shared workspaces have proven to be highly useful, but it seems advisable that their purpose be limited to what they were originally designed for

A group learning management method for intelligent tutoring systems

In this paper we propose a group management specification and execution method that seeks a compromise between simple course design and complex adaptive group interaction. This is achieved through an authoring method that proposes predefined scenarios to the author. These scenarios already include complex learning interaction protocols in which student and group models use and update are automatically included. The method adopts ontologies to represent domain and student models, and object Petri nets to specify the group interaction protocols. During execution, the method is supported by a multi-agent architecture