PERKS: Power Electronics Refined learning via affordable Kit and Software tutor

电力电子技术是智能电网的使能技术。然而，学生们在电力电子课程中经常遇到困难，因为它需要掌握和同时应用几门早期课程中的概念。为了应对这一教育挑战，华盛顿州立大学(WSU)的这个项目的目标包括：(I)设计一个软件导师，帮助学生将视觉信息(电路图)转换为书面信息(方程)，并分析电力电子转换器电路；(Ii)设计一个多功能低成本原型电路套件，用于电力电子转换器的动手实验，无需额外设备。这些委员会提倡随时随地与实验室一起生活的范例。这项工作使电气工程专业的学生更有就业能力，因为他们在一个许多毕业生都在挣扎的领域里很有能力。利用该项目开发的设计和原型产品有可能通过与广泛的商业分销网络合作，接触到世界各地的大学学生。四所大学(威斯康星州立大学、佐治亚理工学院、爱达荷大学和马尼托巴大学)将在其电力电子课程中实施和使用开发的课程材料，预计每年招收150名学生。该项目的成果不仅引起了电力电子教育界的兴趣，也为开发其他多学科课程的类似工具铺平了道路。这个项目的产品支持视觉学习方式，这是许多工科学生首选的学习方式，从而增加了他们的理解，并最终保持了他们的记忆力。在这个项目中开发的软件工具使用一种互动式的良好的教学方法(脚手架)来改善学生的学习和解决问题的技能。脚手架为学生提供了一个模板和动态反馈，帮助他们在学习的早期阶段。因此，学生的自信心将会提高，这有望改善学生在电力工程领域的职业选择。这个项目将是变革性的，因为它开发了一种新的方法，将脚手架、视觉学习和形成性反馈相结合，将电力电子教育转变为更吸引人的体验。外部评估员将评估开发的材料在克服概念困难和改善学生对电力电子的态度方面的有效性。将使用混合方法，强调定性理解和定量数据的补充，包括受试者内的实验设计。除了收集背景信息(例如，性别)和基线测量(例如，先前的知识以及对电力电子的动机和态度)外，还将向学生提供两组具有类似难度级别的问题，并要求他们在有和没有软件导师提供的支架的情况下解决这些问题。学生解决问题的方法将被记录和定量分析，例如完成时间、子电路的正确性、方程的正确性和最终解的正确性。将对学生的技术知识进行评估前和评估后的测试，并分析学生对家庭作业、期中测试和期末考试的反应。

Power electronics is an enabling technology for the smart power grid. However, students often struggle in power electronics courses because it requires mastery and simultaneous application of concepts from several earlier courses. To address this educational challenge, the objectives of this project at Washington State University (WSU) include designing (i) a software tutor to help students translate visual information (circuit diagrams) to written information (equations) and analyze a power electronic converter circuit and (ii) an all-in-one low cost prototype circuit kit for hands-on experimentation with power electronic converters that run off the USB port of a laptop without needing extra equipment. These boards promote an anywhere, anytime, living-with-the-laboratory paradigm. This work makes electrical engineering students more employable by making them competent in an area where many graduates struggle. The designs and prototype products developed with this project have the potential to reach students in universities worldwide through collaboration with an extensive commercial distribution network. Four universities (WSU, Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Idaho, and University of Manitoba) will implement and utilize the developed curricular material in their power electronic courses, with a total expected enrollment of 150 students per year. The outcomes of this project are not only of interest to the power electronics education community, but they also pave the road for developing similar tools for other multidisciplinary courses. The accessible web-based nature of the developed material can affect a broad population.The products of this project support a visual learning style, the preferred learning style of many engineering students, thereby increasing their understanding and ultimately, their retention. The software tool developed in this project uses an interactive well-established pedagogical approach (scaffolding) to improve student learning and problem solving skills. Scaffolding provides students with a template and dynamic feedback to assist them in their early stages of learning. As a result, student self-confidence will improve, which is expected to improve students' choice of careers in power engineering. This project will be transformative because it develops a novel approach that mixes scaffolding, visual learning, and formative feedback to transform power electronics education into a significantly more engaging experience. An external evaluator will gauge the effectiveness of the developed material in overcoming conceptual difficulties and improving students' attitudes toward power electronics. A mixed-methods approach that emphasizes qualitative understandings supplemented by quantitative data will be used, including a within-subjects experimental design. In addition to the collection of background information (e.g., gender) and baseline measures (e.g., prior knowledge and motivation and attitude toward power electronics), the students will be given two sets of problems with similar difficulty levels and asked to solve them with and without the scaffold provided by the software tutor. Students' approaches to problem solving will be recorded and analyzed quantitatively, e.g. completion time, correctness of subcircuits, correctness of equations, and correctness of the final solution. Pre- and post-assessment tests of the students' technical knowledge will be administered and student responses on homework assignments, mid-term tests, and final exams will also be analyzed.