Instrumentation for an Introductory Electronics Course

这个项目将为理科和工程预科学生开设一门电子学入门课程。这门课程将集中于模拟技术，并倾向于为科学提供实用的电子学。我们将使用计算机自动数据采集和控制系统作为教学工具。每个实验站将包括一个通过I/O板和一个GPIB数字万用表连接到计算机工作站的原板，该计算机工作站运行我们用LabVIEW编写的教学软件。学生们将建造电路，并使用LabVIEW软件对其进行探索、测试和控制。基于计算机的数据采集和控制是用来教授电子学的工具，而不是课程本身的重点。通过使用基于计算机的教学，学生将从与传统电子课程相关的大部分单调乏味中解脱出来，并能够专注于材料。此外，我们发现，通过将LabVIEW整合到这门电子学课程中，我们正在开辟教学材料的新方法。这门微积分电子学预科课程的开设，是为了让大多数新生都能学到。这种方法为学生提供了积极的实验室体验，并在他们职业生涯的早期与正规教员进行了一对一的接触。这将使他们开始获得早期的研究经验，并为行业实习做好更好的准备。

This project will create a first-year introductory electronics course for science and pre-engineering students. The course will concentrate on analog techniques, with a slant towards practical electronics for the sciences. We will use computer-automated data acquisition and control systems as instructional tools. Each lab station will include a protoboard interfaced through an I/O board and a GPIB DMM to a computer workstation running instructional software that we have written in LabVIEW. The students will build the circuits and use LabVIEW software to explore, test and control them. Computer-based data acquisition and control are used as tools to teach electronics, not as the focus of the course itself. Through the use of computer-based instruction, the students will be freed of much of the tedium associated with traditional electronics courses and will be able to focus on the material. In addition, we find that by integrating LabVIEW into this electronics course, we are opening up new approaches to teaching the material. This pre-calculus electronics course is offered it at a level that makes it available to most incoming students. This approach provides students with a positive laboratory experience and one-on-one contact with regular faculty members early in their career. This will get them started towards early research experience and better prepare them for industrial internships.