Collaborative Research: Sizing Up Physical Computing to Explore Threshold Concepts in Cyber-Physical Systems

随着网络物理系统（CPS）的应用不断发展，解决与培养具有竞争力的美国劳动力相关的教育挑战和需求变得至关重要。然而，鉴于CPS技术相对年轻，一个关键的挑战在于描述CPS掌握所需的关键概念。此外，合作CPS学习工具的缺乏导致了学生之间的孤立学习实践的趋势，这与CPS设计实践的协作性相矛盾。该项目旨在通过设计和实施物理计算测试平台来克服这些挑战，该测试平台将促进CPS概念的基于问题的协作学习。该试验台将允许学生组，共同位于一张桌子周围，使用有形的用户界面与CPS互动。作为非正式学习和意义建构的生成源，该测试平台将有助于促进CPS教育的社会方法，同时促进我们对CPS掌握所需的学科特定概念的理解。该项目旨在开发一个物理计算测试平台，用于协作，基于问题的CPS学习，以探索和表征CPS学科的阈值概念-这些概念代表变革性，可能难以掌握，在一个给定的学科中整合多个概念的想法。该项目将首先通过一项德尔菲研究让学术界和工业界的CPS专家参与进来，以寻求对掌握CPS所需的基本概念达成共识。接下来，研究方法将交叉阈值概念与协作问题为基础的学习（PBL），以确定掌握CPS设计概念所需的关键形成性学习经验。这些关键的形成性学习经验，锚定在以学生为中心的阈值概念，将通过让学生参与多阶段的问题场景称为模型引发活动进行调查。在模型引发活动中，他们之间的相互作用和测试平台将使用建构主义扎根理论进行分析。通过整合各种数据源，将创建一个全面的CPS概念清单和阈值概念的创新分类，从而对如何最好地利用CPS教育中的PBL和物理计算产生新的理解。研究结果将提高CPS在学术界的学习能力，提高CPS设计能力的从业人员，加强美国的核心功能联邦机构在管理CPS生态系统具有广泛的社会影响。该试验平台将使本科生能够通过合作游戏参与CPS学习，产生的知识将有利于工业，国防和关键基础设施。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

As the applications of Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) continue to advance, it is becoming critical to address the educational challenges and needs associated with cultivating a competitive U.S. workforce with competence in CPS. However, given the relative youth of CPS technology, a crucial challenge lies in characterizing what key concepts are necessary for CPS mastery. Furthermore, the lack of collaborative CPS learning tools has resulted in a trend of solitary learning practices among students, which contradicts the collaborative nature of CPS design practice. This project seeks to overcome these challenges by designing and implementing a physical computing testbed that will foster problem-based, collaborative learning of CPS concepts. The testbed will allow groups of students, co-located around a table, to interact with CPS using a tangible-user interface. As a generative source of informal learning and sense-making, the testbed will help foster a social approach to CPS education, while advancing our understanding of the discipline-specific concepts required for CPS mastery.The project aims to develop a physical computing testbed for collaborative, problem-based CPS learning to explore and characterize the CPS discipline’s threshold concepts – which represent transformative, and potentially difficult-to-grasp, ideas that integrate multiple concepts in a given discipline. The project will first engage CPS experts in academia and industry through a Delphi study to seek consensus on the fundamental concepts necessary for CPS mastery. Next, the research approach will intersect threshold concepts with collaborative problem-based learning (PBL) to identify key formative learning experiences necessary for mastering CPS design concepts. These key formative learning experiences, anchored in student-centered threshold concepts, will be investigated by engaging students in multi-stage problem scenarios called model-eliciting activities. During the model-eliciting activities, their interactions with one another and the testbed will be analyzed using constructivist grounded theory. A comprehensive CPS concept inventory and innovative classification of threshold concepts will be created by integrating the various data sources, leading to a new understanding of how best to leverage PBL and physical computing in CPS education. The findings will improve CPS learning capabilities in academia and enhance CPS design capabilities for practitioners, strengthening the core function of U.S. federal agencies in administering CPS ecosystems with broad societal impacts. The testbed will empower undergraduate students to engage in CPS learning through collaborative play, and the knowledge generated will benefit industry, defense, and critical infrastructure.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.