http://ieeexplore.ieee.org TOC Alert for Publication# 13 2009 November 10 Your (optional) copyright messageType in keywords, separated by commas, that can help listeners locate your podcast when searching with iTunesYour (optional) podcast author email addressYour (optional) podcast author nameYour (optional) podcast author namenoType in keywords, separated by commas, that can help listeners locate your podcast when searching with iTunesType a description you would like potential listeners to see when viewing your podcast listing in iTunesType a description you would like potential listeners to see when viewing your podcast listing in iTunes 52 4 C1 C1 36 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 C2 C2 41 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) Courses in Computer Architecture and Organization are regularly included in Computer Engineering curricula. These courses are usually organized in such a way that students obtain not only a purely theoretical experience, but also a practical understanding of the topics lectured. This practical work is usually done in a laboratory using simulators of computer systems. Since the open literature contains a variety of simulators being used for such purposes, this paper attempts to give a survey of simulators suitable for teaching courses in computer architecture and organization, to establish the evaluation criteria and to evaluate selected simulators according to these criteria. ]]> 52 4 449 458 587 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) Integral equations are becoming a common means for describing problems in electromagnetics, and so it is important to expose students to methods for their solution. Typically this is done using examples in antennas, scattering, or electrostatics. Unfortunately, many difficult issues arise in the formulation and solution of the associated equations. It is instead proposed to use examples from transmission lines, a topic with which undergraduate students are both familiar and comfortable. In this paper, the formulations of integral equations for both uniform and nonuniform lines are undertaken, simple moment-method solutions are implemented, and the accuracies of the solutions are explored. ]]> 52 4 459 469 262 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) This paper proposes an integrated approach for developing the engineering curricula with a specific focus on engineering design. The proposed approach allows a continuous and coherent development of engineering students' design skills throughout the entire undergraduate curriculum. This ongoing design experience is delivered at an involvement and complexity level compatible with the students' study year. In the integrated approach, three different stages are identified: Structured Design Experience, Guided Design Experience, and Open-Ended Design Experience. The objectives, implementation mechanism, and the expected outcomes of each stage are outlined. The proposed methodology systematically develops not only design skills but also teamwork, communication skills, project management, and lifelong learning. The implementation of the proposed approach is demonstrated by presenting courses in the Electronics track which shows the gradual, integrated delivery of structured, guided, and open ended design experiences as students progress from the freshman to the final year of study. As a case study, the delivery of design skills using the proposed approach is assessed through the students' survey in the electrical engineering curriculum at the American University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. ]]> 52 4 470 481 920 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) With the advent of the World Wide Web, many business applications that utilize data mining and text mining techniques to extract useful business information on the Web have evolved from Web searching to Web mining. It is important for students to acquire knowledge and hands-on experience in Web mining during their education in information systems curricula. This paper reports on an experience using open Web Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) that have been made available by major Internet companies (e.g., Google, Amazon, and eBay) in a class project to teach Web mining applications. The instructor's observations of the students' performance and a survey of the students' opinions show that the class project achieved its objectives and students acquired valuable experience in leveraging the APIs to build interesting Web mining applications. ]]> 52 4 482 490 1241 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) Remote and virtual laboratory classes are an increasingly prevalent alternative to traditional hands-on laboratory experiences. One of the key issues with these modes of access is the provision of adequate audiovisual (AV) feedback to the user, which can be a complicated and resource-intensive challenge. This paper reports on a comparison of two studies of remote and virtual access to hardware, one with rich AV feedback and one without. The comparison shows that the learning outcomes of the remote access mode are dependent upon the richness of the feedback; the learning outcomes of the simulated access mode are largely robust to an absence of feedback. The students' preferences are affected by the feedback, with a clear preference for richer feedback. ]]> 52 4 491 502 3003 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) This paper presents an integrated research and teaching model that has resulted from an NSF-funded effort to introduce results of current Machine Learning research into the engineering and computer science curriculum at the University of Central Florida (UCF). While in-depth exposure to current topics in Machine Learning has traditionally occurred at the graduate level, the model developed affords an innovative and feasible approach to expanding the depth of coverage in research topics to undergraduate students. The model has been self-sustaining as evidenced by its continued operation during the years after the NSF grant's expiration, and is transferable to other institutions due to its use of modular and faculty-specific technical content. This model offers a tightly coupled teaching and research approach to introducing current topics in Machine Learning research to undergraduates, while also involving them in the research process itself. The approach has provided new mechanisms to increase faculty participation in undergraduate research, has exposed approximately 15 undergraduates annually to research at UCF, and has effectively prepared a number of these students for graduate study through active involvement in the research process and coauthoring of publications. ]]> 52 4 503 512 854 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) This paper describes a practical experience of adapting the teaching of a course in Computer Technology (CT) to the new demands of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). CT is a core course taught in the first year of the degree program Technical Engineering in Management Computing in the Faculty of Computer Science at the University of A CoruÑa (UDC), Spain. The contents of this course are mainly devoted to the design of digital systems. The main purpose of the adaptation has been to focus more on students, clearly defining the abilities they will develop during the course and suggesting activities that facilitate the development of those abilities. The aim of this work is to describe how this adaptation was performed, the materials and activities prepared, the difficulties encountered, the goals achieved and the response of students and teachers to these changes. ]]> 52 4 513 523 706 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) This paper presents experiences and results from a project task in power electronics for students at Chalmers University of Technology, GÖteborg, Sweden, based on a flyback test board. The board is used in the course Power Electronic Devices and Applications. In the project task, the students design snubber circuits, improve the control of the output voltage, improve the gate drive of the main MOSFET transistor and study the influence of stray inductance. The project goals (the circuit improvements) are given, but the procedure for solving the problems and obtaining the results is not specified. Instead the students have to make their own specification in order to reach the goals. “Tools” that are given to the students are the hardware, measurement equipment, an example of the circuit in the circuit simulation software PSpice, and lastly lectures covering the material needed in order to attain the project goals. The project design builds on the ideas from the CDIO (Conceive, Design, Implement, Operate) initiative, where students are encouraged to consider the complete process structure. The result found was a substantial engagement by the students, who had both positive and negative reactions. The negative reactions were mainly that the project specification was too vague, in other words in the (C=Conceive)-phase of the CDIO structure. Further, the teachers observed increased learning, which also was noticeable for the students performing their M.Sc. thesis within the power electronics design area. Finally, it was found that a final written exam is definitely still needed to assess students adequately in the course. ]]> 52 4 524 531 615 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) In this paper, the authors focus their attention on the way magnetic circuits and permanent magnets are usually treated in most textbooks and electrical engineering courses. This paper demonstrates how this important topic is too often presented simplistically. This simplistic treatment does not allow the students to develop a complete understanding of the problem, and it leads to a misinterpretation of the sometimes wrong results obtained by using the most common formulas. A guideline and a set of examples, which could help the students to a better understanding of the topic, are presented here. ]]> 52 4 532 537 800 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) The computer science classes in China's institutions of higher education often have large numbers of students. In addition, many institutions offer “blended” classes that include both on-campus and online students. These large blended classrooms have long suffered from a lack of interactivity. Many online classes simply provide recorded instructor lectures to which distance students listen after downloading. This format only reinforces the negative effects of passive nonparticipatory learning. At a major university in Shanghai, researchers and developers actively seek technological interventions that can greatly increase interactivity in blended classes. They have developed a cutting-edge mobile learning system that can deliver live broadcasts of real-time classroom teaching to online students with mobile devices. Their system allows students to customize their means of content-reception, based on when and where the students are tuning into the broadcast. The system also supports short text-messaging and instant polls. Through these features, students can ask questions and make suggestions in real time, and the instructor can respond immediately. This paper describes this system in detail and also reports results from a formal implementation of the system with a blended classroom of 562 students (of whom 90% were online). ]]> 52 4 538 546 286 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) This paper reports the integration of supplementary training in academic literacy, for those without the assumed entry standard, into a standard electrical engineering program without compromising any other educational objectives. All students who commenced an engineering degree were tested as part of their first session's assessment activities. Those identified as having inadequate academic literacy were directed to study a specifically designed credit-bearing course, which is controlled by the Engineering Faculty but was designed and is taught in collaboration with academic literacy teachers. Students who completed this course responded positively and also demonstrated measurable improvement in their communication skills. The approach has alleviated the skepticism about teaching academic literacy usually found amongst engineering faculty staff and has been adopted by the wider Engineering Faculty. ]]> 52 4 547 554 156 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) Game-based assignments typically form an integral component of computer programming courses. The effectiveness of the assignments in motivating students to carry out repetitive programming tasks is somewhat limited since their outcomes are invariably limited to a simple win or loss scenario. Accordingly, this paper develops a simulation environment in which students can create a game strategy via programming for a challenging strategy-type game. After completion of the game, the environment provides the student with a set of metrics that provides helpful clues as to how the student might reprogram the strategy to improve the result. The provided metrics help to avoid a tedious trial-and-error refinement process and, therefore, greatly motivate the student to complete the assignment and achieve a better result. The simulation environment can be used in either a standalone mode or in an interactive mode in which the students compete against one another online. The competition element increases the motivation of the students to complete the task to the best of their ability. ]]> 52 4 555 562 676 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) Educational institutions pay careful attention to the design of program curricula, which represent a framework to meet institutional goals and missions. Of course, the success of any institution depends highly on the quality of its program curriculum. The development of such a curriculum and, more importantly, the evaluation of its quality are complex and time-consuming processes. This traditional approach requires many cumbersome manual iterations, making it a long and error-prone process. To overcome these problems, this paper proposes a new curriculum support engine as an alternative approach. The proposed curriculum support engine is a Web-based application that helps in designing any program curriculum in real time. The engine incorporates several important features, allowing the verification of the proposed curriculum coherence and the generation of statistics necessary for academic and accreditation purposes. Useful viewing and editing tools are also provided. The proposed curriculum support engine is flexible and allows additional criteria that the curriculum designer can specify to be incorporated. In particular, the engine covers the Accreditation of Canadian Engineering Programs (CEAB), the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET), and the Commission of Academic Accreditation of the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research of UAE (CAA-UAE). ]]> 52 4 563 572 1909 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) The concepts of an equivalent electrical circuit and maximum power transfer are difficult for some students to comprehend. A laboratory exercise is presented that facilitates the teaching of Thevenin's equivalent circuit and maximum power transfer through the use of a black box equipped with two external terminals. The laboratory exercise has improved students' understanding of these important electrical engineering concepts. ]]> 52 4 573 575 200 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 576 576 154 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 577 577 168 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 578 578 320 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 579 580 1065 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 581 590 99 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 C3 C3 32 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) 52 4 C4 C4 5 Your (optional) podcast author email address (Your (optional) podcast author name) en-usYour (optional) copyright messageYour (optional) podcast author namenonadult