Conference Session

Re-Imagining the Higher Ed Classroom -- Tablet PCs

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Elliot Moore, Georgia Institute of Technology; Monson Hayes, Georgia Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

paradigmsfor effective student instruction into a unique classroom structure where the instructor andstudents may not be present in the same physical learning environment. Despite the technologythat is available to deliver video and audio streams to remote classrooms, DL environments arestill challenged in the area of promoting active learning and meaningful instructor-student andstudent-student interactions during a class session. Traditional DL classrooms suffer fromseveral challenges in creating effective learning environments, and most of them center on twomain issues: 1) poor delivery of lecture material and 2) constraints on creating in-class materialfor participant interaction and student assessment.The delivery of lecture content is largely

Conference Session

Web-Based Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Olowokere, University of Alabama at Birmingham; Kayode P. Ayodele, Obafemi Awolowo University; Olutola Jonah; Temitope O. Ajayi, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria; O.O. Akinwunmi, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

Internet is used as a mediumto allow users access remote laboratory hardware or software resources. RVLs are broadlyclassified under two categories: remote laboratories and virtual laboratories. Remote laboratoriesare systems whereby users are given access to real hardware backends located at a remote site.Virtual laboratories are RVL systems whose backend systems under test are implemented insoftware.Various implementations of RVL have been described 1-9 and advantages ascribed to them haveincluded ease of use, reduced safety concerns, scalability, availability, and minimal staffingrequirement9. The various reported implementations have also demonstrated that RVLs canachieve, to a large extent, the thirteen objectives of experimentation in

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Roger Hadgraft, The University of Melbourne

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

,where they work on engineering teams spread across the globe 21.Of course, students also need to be able to easily learn new skills, because otherwise they tryto keep applying only a limited range of skills when a new skill or insight is needed. “Everytask looks like a nail if the only tool you have is a hammer”. This is the essence of lifelonglearning.So, students need to be able to move from the project task to skill development and backagain (Figure 1). This matches the situation they will find themselves in industry, where new Page 13.320.4ideas are required and there is past experience from which to draw.At the moment, skill development is

Conference Session

Programming for Engineering Students I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Mathieu Desnoyers, Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal; Michel Dagenais, Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

rightvisualization plugin. Interestingly, all the views are synchronized with each other to help linkingthe information provided by the various analysis plugins. This section will show how abstractconcepts (process, paging (copy-on-write), thread, CPU and interruption) can be studied with thehelp of LTTV.5.1 ProcessA view called “Control flow view” (Figure 1), available in LTTV, shows the single-threaded pro-cesses executing on the system. These programs, each made of a single execution thread, havetheir own virtual memory space and interact with each other and with the computer resources byusing the operating system’s “system calls”. We can follow their execution through time, as fork,exit and scheduling events occurs. We can see here, in the case of an

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sabina Jeschke, University of Stuttgart; Olivier Pfeiffer, Technische Universitaet Berlin; Thomas Richter, University of Stuttgart

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

. by[19]. Virtual laboratories are also explored as on-shore educational tools to train the technicalskills of sailors of the US navy, see [1].SCORM 1.2 [16] treats all SCOs as separate entities and does not allow them to carry overinformation on the learning process from one SCO to another, and thus to establish the necessarydata to setup an adaptive system. This changed with the SCORM 2004 standard [17]. Possibleapproaches how to reach adaptivity in SCORM have been studied by Mödritscher, García-Barrios and Gütl in [10], though the authors conclude that the lack of metadata standardizationfor the SCOs hinders adaptivity of a SCORM driven LMS. A suitable set of metadata has beenidentified by the “Knowledge On Demand” project [15] within which

Conference Session

Embedded Computing

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Michael Holden, California Maritime Academy

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

device (DAQ) with Labview as well as a standalone data logger in a measurement systems course. ‚ Be the cornerstone of mechatronics laboratory robotics work.There are many systems that could satisfy these requirements. For example, the Basic Stamp [1]is a popular microcontroller for educational uses. Simple systems like the Atmel Butterfly [2],GumStix [3] computers, and the Brainstem controller [4] would all work, although some can bemore costly than specified. But it is so easy to design a new microcontroller system that acustom circuit board is also an attractive solution. A circuit board to support a microcontrollerdoes not need many components and is inexpensive and easy to assemble.A microcontroller experiment board that was

Conference Session

Programming for Engineering Students I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

William Birmingham, Grove City College; Vincent DiStasi, Grove City College

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

softwareGrove City College has a 1:1 mobile computing program, now in its second decade, where eachstudent receives at the start of his or her freshman year a computer. For the past four years, thecomputer has been a Hewlett-Packard Tablet PC. Currently, there are about 2500 Tablet PCsused by students and about 120 used by faculty. Page 13.144.2Complementing the hardware program, the college provides software to support the entire CSand engineering curriculum from integrated development environments (IDEs) to applicationssuch as MatLab and Maya. Moreover, the Tablet PC has a variety of software applications thatare pen-aware, such as Microsoft® Word and

Conference Session

Educational Software

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sam Shearman, National Instruments; Erik Luther, National Instruments; Ed Doering, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

VIs, are more dynamic, intended toengage the student with video presentations and interactive exploration of concepts. Figure 1shows a typical module from this course, “Additive Synthesis Techniques.”5 Page 13.214.2Figure 1, Screencasts and downloadable VIs are key elements of the “Additive Synthesis Techniques” learning module (left) andothers that comprise the “Musical Signal Processing with LabVIEW” course.Engaging Students with ScreencastingScreencast videos (“Screencasts”) play a central role the modules created for this project.Screencasts are narrated video presentations that can be thought of as a multi-frame screen

Conference Session

Hardware Descriptive Language Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jonathan Hill, University of Hartford

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

settings to introduce students to the fundamentals of engineering. In some cases,students are provided with a kit that allows them to experience the process of building the robotas well as the design and programming aspects.Our project uses the advantages of both approaches to target multiple audiences. Each of thefollowing groups will benefit from the various types of interaction that are possible, rangingfrom graduate students participating in design and prototyping to high school students observinga control system demonstration. The toolkit is ideal for addressing different levels of interest andinvolvement. The possible audiences include: 1. High school students interested in engineering 2. University or community college technology

Conference Session

Computer Simulation and Animation I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

James Reising, University of Evansville; Mark Randall, University of Evansville

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

arbitrary units used forthe transmitted pulse.The received signal is the sum of the noise and the transmitted pulse, delayed by the sampleperiods selected by the user (constrained so the “received” pulse cannot overlap the transmittedpulse) with amplitude attenuated by the square of the reciprocal delay.Both the transmitted signal and the received signal are represented by sequences of length N (setto 2000 in the program). The sequence representing the transmitted pulse is zero-padded tolength N.The detector output is computed as the cross-correlation1 of the received signal and the N −1− ktransmitted pulse sequences: R(k ) = 1 N ∑x

Conference Session

Web-Based Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Felipe Arango, Stevens Institute of Technology; Gonca Altuger, Stevens Institute of Technology; El-Sayed Aziz, Stevens Institute of Technology; Constantin Chassapis, Stevens Institute of Technology; Sven Esche, Stevens Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

student groups anddid not provide the students with the flexibility to perform the experiments at their own scheduleand to potentially re-run them.Previous Experimental Setup and ProceduresThe industrial plant emulator shown in Figure 1 is a system that is designed to teach students theworking principles and the underlying theory of gear sets and belt drives. It introduces thestudents to the modeling of inertia, friction, backlash and stiffness phenomena in machines. Theindustrial plant emulator setup consists of a drive disk and a load disk, which are connected toeach other via a speed reduction unit. Furthermore, the emulator system is equipped withencoders connected to the drive and disturbance motors and a friction brake

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Dianne Raubenheimer, North Carolina State University; Rebecca Brent, Education Designs Inc.; Jeff Joines, North Carolina State University; Amy Craig, North Carolina State University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

Education, 2008 Integration of Computer-Based Problem Solving into Engineering CurriculaAbstractThe primary objectives of this engineering project are (1) to examine how to develop students’problem solving and computational skills early in their program of study and (2) to furtherenhance these skills by building upon critical computing concepts semester after semester. Theproject is a component of NC State University’s quality enhancement plan, which focuses on theuse of technology in enhancing student learning. The project stems from new introductorycomputer-based modeling courses that were created in two engineering departments, and hasexpanded to include other departments. We give an overview of the

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Carole Goodson, University of Houston; Barbara Stewart, University of Houston; Susan Miertschin, University of Houston; Luces Faulkenberry, University of Houston

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

OK if I use it as a template for my work this fall? • What kind of information can I use from a website and how can I use it? • There is a lot of programming code available for free on the Internet. May I use it for this project?Review of the LiteratureRecent literature addresses numerous concerns and indicates that academic honesty continues tobe an issue for faculty and students alike, and it reports on the impact of technology and existingperceptions.Technology and Academic Honesty Academic honesty is a pervasive issue for educators suchas reported by Jordan & Elmore,12 Bikowski and Broeckelman,1 and Cordova and Thornhill. 4Indeed, Whitley 21 reported on more than 100 research studies on cheating in a 30 year

Conference Session

Embedded Computing

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Christopher Carroll, University of Minnesota-Duluth

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

,the MC68HC12.2,3,4,5 Figure 1. The Freescale Dragon development board as used in the lab stationThe lab stations to be described here implement a microprocessor lab in which students learn towrite programs in assembly language and to interface external devices through the input/outputcapabilities of the processor. Each station consists of a commercial Dragon development boardfrom Freescale, shown in Figure 1, which has been enhanced through the addition of hardwareand software to be described. Each station interfaces to a single lab host personal computer overa standard terminal line. The host computer runs the multi-user LINUX operating system, andprovides file storage, editing, assembling, and downloading capabilities for the lab

Conference Session

Web-Based Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Mahmoud Quweider, The University of Texas at Brownsville; Fitra Khan, U of Texas at Brownsville; Juan Iglesias, The University of Texas at Brownsville

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

enrolls over 14,500 students with more than 92% Hispanics. Inan effort to meet regional demands in science and technology, a new Science, Mathematics andTechnology College (SMT) complex was recently built to house computer science, engineeringtechnology, physics, and mathematics course offerings. Fig. 1. CIS Programs Part of the Science, Mathematics and Technology College (SMT), the CIS department hasmore than 652 students majoring in its technical and science (academic) disciplines. As figure 1show, two disciplines have parallel degrees with the technical offering a Certificate of ComputerInformation Systems, Associate in Applied Science, and a Bachelor of Applied Technology inComputer Information

Conference Session

Re-Imagining the Higher Ed Classroom -- Tablet PCs

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Vinod Lohani, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Ricky Castles, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Aditya Johri, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Dewey Spangler, Virginia Western Community College; David Kibler, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

Engineering (COE) at Virginia Tech1. This initiative made itmandatory for all engineering freshmen (~1300 each year) to own a Tablet PC starting fall 2006.Figure 1 shows the response to an exit survey question (~220 respondents in fall 2006 and ~540respondents in fall 2007) showing ownership of Tablets by brand. In 1984, the COE was the firstpublic institution in the U.S. to require its entering engineering freshmen to own a personalcomputer. In 2002, the college moved to a laptop requirement and many of its academicbuildings were outfitted to offer wireless communication capabilities. Tablet PC Ownership by Brand Tablet PC Ownership by Brand Fall 2006

Conference Session

Instrumentation and Laboratory Systems

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Nabil Lehlou, University of Arkansas; Nebil Buyurgan, University of Arkansas; Justin Chimka, University of Arkansas

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

acomputer program that acts like an interpreter from XML to the native language of a device andvice-versa. In other words, the hardware device is wrapped with a software translator, andtherefore, mutated into an agent that can speak XML to other agents. So, where do we go fromhere? Figure 1 Illustrating how an object operates after it is wrapped by an EiA interpreter EiA BenefitsLet’s start with one of the most popular areas in engineering: system design. Systems thatinvolve software can greatly benefit from EiA, because by its nature, EiA leads to constructingagents that are independent of the outside world. To clarify this, think of a system as a set ofindependent, but interrelated, agents. If the system breaks, only the responsible

Conference Session

Computer Simulation and Animation II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Christiaan Gribble, Grove City College

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

mathematics from Grove City College in 2000, the MS degree in information networking from Carnegie Mellon University in 2002, and the PhD degree in computer science from the University of Utah in 2006. Page 13.1019.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2008 Ray Tracing for Undergraduates1. IntroductionThe computer graphics research community has recently renewed its interest in ray tracing, animage synthesis algorithm that simulates the interaction of light with an environment to generatehighly realistic images (Figure 1). Recent hardware trends and algorithmic developments makethe

Conference Session

Instrumentation and Laboratory Systems

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Minh Cao, Wichita State University; John Watkins, Wichita State University; Richard O'Brien, U.S. Naval Academy

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

allows the student to view both root locus andBode information. Unlike the GUI in this paper, the built in design tools are not based on theunified design procedures of the author’s previous work.9,10 Consequently, it does not providethe same seamless integration for the students as they transition from simple classroom exercisesto more complicated lab and design projects.Compensator DesignThe integrated design procedure using time or frequency domain plant data requires ageneralization of the angle criterion from root locus design. The standard closed-loop system isshown in Figure 1 where K is the control gain, Gc (s) is the compensator and G p ( s ) representsthe plant dynamics. R ( s

Conference Session

Hardware Descriptive Language Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jonathan Hill, University of Hartford

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

) can be thought of as referring to the next instruction however due to pre-fetchinghas a twist discussed later, that the assembly language programmer should be lessconcerned with.To express a program that makes use of the CPU registers and memory, it is convenientto have an assembly language. In writing assembly code we will be most concerned withsymbols and labels. A symbol is a symbolic name for a value. A label is like a symbol,except that the value must be an address. The assembly language file format is brokeninto lines. A line is organized into as many as four possible fields. A comment can beinserted at the end of a line or an entire line can be a comment. 1. The left-most field contains a label, symbol, or a semicolon ‘;’ used to

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Suleiman Ashur, Indiana University - Purdue University Fort Wayne; S. Scott Moor, Indiana University-Purdue University-Fort Wayne; Essam Zaneldin, Indiana University Purdue University Fort Wayne

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

impact whatsoever on their assessmentin the class. A copy of the letter and both surveys are attached at the end of this report. Page 13.694.3Objectives and MethodologyThe study is an attempt to assess the benefits of remotely accessing software using Citrix. Theobjectives of the study are to measure the impact of remotely accessing software on improvingstudents’ performance and to conduct a casual economic impact on IPFW computerinfrastructure. In order to achieve the goals of this study, the following steps were undertaken: 1) Develop and conduct initial survey of students’ background and usages of the software needed in their classes

Conference Session

Embedded Computing

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jeff Wiegley, California State University-Northridge

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

issufficiently different from the theory required for the design of hardware for em-bedded applications. Clear communication was required during the course approvalprocess to ensure that no department boundaries were crossed and that the resultingcourse enhances the entire engineering curriculum.The equipment for the course is a costly investment. The long-term reliability andmaintenance of devices was a major concern. Many development or evaluationplatforms for micro-controllers are exposed and prone to damage. They are notdesigned for repeated use and the abuse that an instruction lab may demand. Thereliability issue was solved by selecting more rugged platforms such as the LegoRCX brick, depicted in Figure 1, and the MIT Handyboard computer, Figure 2

Conference Session

Embedded Computing

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Alejandra J. Magana; Sean Brophy, Purdue University; George Bodner, Purdue University, West Lafayette

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

in the NCN focus areas, b) they are flexible forrunning online from a web browser powered by a highly sophisticated architecture thatlets the user tap into national grid resources, and c) they provide a friendly andinteractive graphical user interface that allows the tools to be operated by non-experts(see Figure 1). Figure 1a: nano-Materials simulation toolkit Figure 1b: MOSFET Figure 1: Samples of interfaces of nanoHUB simulation toolsThe nanoHUB continues to grow in its volume of resources and learning materials. In Page 13.1005.3particular, recent years has seen an increase in investigators and graduate

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Bowman, Clemson University; Elizabeth Stephan, Clemson University; Lisa Benson, Clemson University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

for their tours, andreports back to the first year program on actual attendance.The event registration component of GEO allows a faculty member to release departmental toursby typing in all of the details of each tour in the web-based administration interface. GEOhandles the scheduling of each individual tour by providing a graphical calendar of events(Figure 1) to the student which allows each student to enroll themselves in their preferred tours.There are built in rules in the system that prevents students from enrolling in tours that are atcapacity, and from enrolling in more than 3 tours without instructor permission. Theadministrative instructor has the ability to manually enroll a student in a full tour, if necessary. Ifa tour fills up

Conference Session

Mobile Robots in Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Anthony Reed, Louisiana Tech University; Taylor Creekbaum, Louisiana Tech University; Matthew Elliott, Louisiana Tech University; David Hall, Louisiana Tech University; Davis Harbour, Louisiana Tech University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

set up in a lecture / laboratory formatand meet twice a week for 1 hour and 50 minutes. These three engineering courses add up to sixsemester hours and span the entire freshman year.The “original” freshman engineering course sequence between 1998 and the spring of 2007included engineering fundamentals (circuits, material balance and statics), computer applications(Excel, Mathcad and Solid Edge), statistics, engineering economics, teamwork, communicationskills, and a design project. The students did most of their work in teams, including homeworkproblems, laboratory activities and presentations. The freshman year culminated in a designcompetition between student teams.In 2002, the College began to pilot a robotics-centered set of freshman

Conference Session

Computer Education Management Tools II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Thomas Doyle, McMaster University; Adrian Ieta, Murray State University; Sheng Qian, McMaster University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

a higher level of integrity. Rather than performing a straightcomparison, our entropy based method generates a symbolic library of the file and then analysesthe library structure against all other file libraries as a measure of academic integrity; this methoddefeats the short comings of the aforementioned methods. This paper will present our entropybased method and its high level of success verifying the academic integrity of large sets ofassignment submissions.1. IntroductionAssessment of student work is one of the few methods we have as instructors to communicate ifthe student has attained an acceptable mastery of the subject. As instructors we also use this“conversation” to gauge our own success at the transfer of incremental pieces of

Conference Session

Educational Software

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Cameron Wright, University of Wyoming; Michael Morrow, University of Wisconsin - Madison; Mark Allie, University of Wisconsin - Madison; Thad Welch, Boise State University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

some of our real-time DSP- based community outreach efforts, and more traditional engineering courses, that have been facilitated by tools such as winDSK6 and the DTMF decoder/power switch box.1 INTRODUCTIONDigital signal processing (DSP) is a topic that is covered in some way in nearly every undergraduateECE program. While there are many fine texts available,1–4 many educators and authors haverecognized the need for more interactive learning and the use of demonstrations for this importantsubject.5–8 Since the late 1990’s, the authors have been suggesting and providing proven DSPteaching methodologies, hardware and software solutions, and DSP tools that have helped motivatestudents and faculty to implement real-time DSP-based

Conference Session

Computer Simulation and Animation II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Avanzato, Pennsylvania State University, Abington Campus

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

usingvirtual worlds to enhance college education in a variety of disciplines. Students alsoexplored a variety of educational sites in Second Life which included a guided tour of acomputer company. 3D modeling tools and the effectiveness of virtual classroom fordistance education were also explored. Lessons learned in the use of Second Life withstudents are presented as well as resources to guide educators in exploring Second Life tosupport educational goals. Second Life offers the potential to enhance the educationalexperience in many disciplines and provides new opportunities to collaborate.1. Introduction Second Life [1] is an on-line, 3D, virtual community that provides an immersiveenvironment for students to interact, communicate, explore

Conference Session

Mobile Robots in Education

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Avanzato, Pennsylvania State University, Abington Campus

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

navigateunmarked, paved pathways on a suburban college campus and reach GPS waypoints.Robots must avoid obstacles and robots are also awarded points for interacting andentertaining spectators. A successful robot platform constructed for less than $300 andcontrolled by a laptop running MATLAB software was developed by undergraduatestudents. The contest, offered annually, was first offered in 2005 and is open to studentsat all levels of education (K-12 and college) and beyond. This contest can be used tosuccessfully introduce computer vision and other robot technologies into theundergraduate curriculum.1. IntroductionAn outdoor robot design contest, called the Mini Grand Challenge, was developed at thePenn State Abington campus to promote advances in robot

Conference Session

Programming for Engineering Students I

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Louis Plebani, Lehigh University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

provide a framework and base computer code forstudents to achieve an ease of modeling and solution for dynamic programming similar towhat has been achieved for linear programming. In so far as the teaching dynamicprogramming, this will allow educators in operations research to focus their teaching onissues relevant to dynamic programming as opposed to computer programming issues; andallow students in operations research to focus their learning on the power of dynamicprogramming, as opposed to the nuances of computer implementations.Since the formulation of Dynamic programming (DP) by Bellman,1 it has been successfullyapplied to a variety of problems, including capacity planning, equipment replacement,production planning, production control