Remote Experiments in Freshman Engineering Education by Integrated e-Learning

Abstract

Information communication technologies (ICT) have made it possible to introduce Integrated e-Learning (INTe-L) as a new strategy for teaching physics in engineering education. It is based on the methods that the sciences use for the cognition of the real world. INTe-L utilizes the e-laboratory which consists of remote experiments, e-simulations, and e-textbooks. Its main features include observations of real world phenomena, possibly materialized in data and their evaluation, the search for relevant information, its classification and storing. Only then come the explanation and the mathematical formalism of generalized laws and their consequences. Essential to this method is the active part the student must take in the learning process: in lessons, seminars, and laboratory exercises, but also his/her substantially increased activity in form of projects, search for information, presentations, et cetera. In this chapter, we present the outlines of the remote laboratory integrated in the INTe-L system, using the Internet School Experimental System (ISES) as hardware and an ISES WEB Control kit as software. We suggest an architecture for implementing remote laboratories, with data transfer across the Internet, based on standard and reusable ISES modules as hardware and Java supported ISES software. The Learning Management System (LMS) MOODLE turns out to be a highly effective means of organization of physics courses. The first experience on teaching units Free fall (http://remotelab4.truni.sk), Simple Pendulum (http://remotelab5.truni.sk), and Natural and driven oscillations (www.ises.info – see Remote laboratory) is presented.