Complex Approach to Developing Computer-based Electrical Engineering Education

The technological advances which have occurred in recent years have forced tertiary engineering institutions to search for more advanced and efficient teaching methods. More undergraduate curricula now include the use of computers in teaching programmes, not only for complex computations and computer simulation, but also as an important vehicle for the delivery of teaching material and instructions. This paper gives a comprehensive overview of the variety of research and developmental activities for computer-based education which is carried out in the School of Electrical Engineering at The University of Sydney. The paper endeavours to demonstrate a complex approach to the application of computers in teaching electrical engineering. Particular emphasis is placed on the research and development of computer-based training programmes for undergraduate students, discussing some issues relevant to this important topic.     

New Directions in Electrical Engineering Education

Virtually all of us believe in the great importance of physics in engineering curricula and have fought for years to develop a strong and modern physical basis for instruction in engineering. From our observations, the basic question is no longer seriously disputed; the idea is generally accepted and only the details of local implementation seem to remain. If this is so, why does discussion continue on what should be a dead issue? Why do we continue to beat an academic "dead horse?" In searching for the answer, we have come to some disturbing conclusions which, theoretically, place the entire issue in a different perspective, establishing new directions in electrical engineering education.     

建立本科生科研和工程实践体系的成功探索

依托国家级和省部级重点实验室 ,西南交通大学建立了面向本科生开放的科研和工程实践体系。本文详细介绍了该体系的结构、内容、管理和保障措施 ,以及通过实践创新体系的建设 ,为大学生提供了一个培养一专多能的平台 ,使科研与教学得到有机结合 ,完善了本科人才实践与创新教育模式 ;同时 ,学生实践与创新能力得到显著提高 ,重点实验室的资源和潜力得到有效挖掘。实施效果表明 ,该体系具有在普通高校广泛推广的价值。     

课程设计改进及实施的方法——以《建筑电气技术》为例

以《建筑电气技术》为例,,从课程定位、内容设计、教学实施等3个方面探讨了如何改进课程设计及实施,主要体现在从学科体系改变为工作任务体系,在教学中重视工程规范,讲解科技发展史,在教学细节上切实培养学生专业能力以外的其它能力和素质,对基础课及专业课的教学改革均具有普遍意义.     

新工科背景下突出工程教育的电气专业实践体系

针对新工科建设中的先进工程教育理念,详细分析了电气工程及其自动化专业的实践教学体系中急需解决的问题。将实践课程分门别类,优化实践内容,建立了以工程教育为导向的电气专业实践体系。实践教学中采取适当的教学模式、教学方法、考核方式,配合实验室和实习基地的建设,实现学生多种工程素质能力的提升,满足新工科背景下工程教育培养的目标和要求。     

A Problem-based Learning Approach to Civil Engineering Drawing

Civil engineering drawing courses need to relate to the students expectations, and discipline and maintain their interest. The main objectives of the drawing course in the Department of Civil Engineering at Monash University are: to teach students the main drawing techniques; to enable students to read and transmit the details on these drawings into understandable information and instructions; to develop the visualization skills of students; and to teach them to present their ideas using drawings. These aims are not uncommon, the main innovation in teaching this material was the introduction of a problem-based learning approach in the progressive assessment. A problem was set and the students asked to solve it progressively. The course was built around a particular civil engineering structure; a house. This allowed many of the students to relate the drawing to their experience and expectations. The house was used as a basis for the development of ideas and the presentation of these ideas using a large number of drawing types. Students' reaction to the course was positive. Statements like “This course is real engineering” were common. Areas for further improvement in the approach are highlighted.     

A Merged Approach to Stochastics in Engineering Curricula

RESUME

Many engineers lack the necessary expertise to correctly analyse and interpret data resulting from an experiment. The conceptual framework of stochastics lies in the possibility of measuring the expectation of future' events on the basis of ‘past’ statistical data. Their observation leads in general to a decrease of uncertainty with respect to the initial situation: the measurement of this uncertainty can be quantitatively carried out through the concept of probability. We maintain that the precise and rigorous formulation of this process of ‘learning from experience’ can be realized by a merging of the Bayesian inferential procedure with the subjective and intuitive ‘real-life’ concept of probability as degree of belief.

Beaucoup d'ingenieurs manquent de I'expertise necessaire pour analyser et interpreter les données fournies par une expérience. Le cadre conceptuel de la statistique réside dans la possibilité de mesurer la plausibilité de certains événements ‘futures’; on se basant sur les résultats des observations statistiques ‘passees’. La connaissance de cettes données conduit en général à une diminution de I'incertitude en comparaison de la situation initiate: cette incertitude peut etre mesuree grâce au concept de probabilité. Nous soutenons que la formulation precise et rigoureuse de ce procédé (‘apprendre par I'experience’) peut être réalisée au moyen d'un amalgame entre le procédé inférentiel Bayésien et le concept subjectifM intuitif de probabilité comme ‘degré de croyance’.     

A Look at the New Electrical Engineering Laboratory Program at the Hopkins

The undergraduate electrical engineering program at The Johns Hopkins University has undergone extensive revision. The most striking revision has been in the laboratory program. Laboratory courses which are distinct from the lecture courses have been developed. These laboratory courses embrace the fields of basic and advanced electrical measurements, transducers, passive circuits, active networks, communications, microwaves, materials, computers, servomechanisms, and energy conversion. The experiments in each one of these fields are designed to give the student insight into both the basic and advanced concepts involved. The sequence of presentation of the experiments is chosen to allow the most complete coverage of a subject as possible, based on the order in which the electrical engineering lecture courses are taken. The use of laboratory manuals, notebooks, reports, and examinations has been given careful thought and some significant ideas have been evolved with regard to their use in establishing a successful laboratory course.     

Electrical Engineering in the New Netherlands Educational System

The general education process is discussed with emphasis on electrical engineering at the level of higher professional education institutes and at university level. By law, a shorter curriculum was introduced at universities in 1982. In this paper attention is given to the project stimulating micro-electronic design. The various possibilities in the post-graduate studies are also mentioned. Some differences from other European educational systems are touched upon.     

教育人口研究新探

教育人口是指受过教育的人口总称。教育人口作为一个新兴的领域,它的研究是跨学科的。教育人口学的研究,目前仍处于初创阶段,研究内容仍以"教育与人口的关系研究"为主。无论作为领域或学科,教育人口研究对知识增进与问题解决兼具价值。教育人口研究需由跨学科形态走向学科形态,并不断深化和拓展教育人口学的研究范围。     

A New Approach to BEC Assessment

Abstract

Three key researches bearing on YTS are analysed: that of the IMS (Institute for Manpower Studies) which provided the training rationale for YTS; an important economic analysis (Chapman &; Tooze 1987); and Raffe's long‐term study derived from the SYPS (Scottish Young People's Survey). A series of ‘contradictions’ are examined which are likely to undermine YTS, the most serious being MSC's ambiguous role as a manager of both employment and unemployment. The IMS rationale is defective and ideologically based but has become institutionally entrenched. In practice it proves counterproductive, particularly with regard to the OTF (Occupational Training Families) system. Because of this YTS does not meet real labour market needs; there has been a reversal of the roles of supply and demand. Raffe argues that improving the quality of YTS has no bearing on its success or failure. He stresses the ‘primacy of context’ over content, arguing that unless labour market contexts are changed, YTS cannot succeed. In the educational context a ‘vicious circle of low status’ is identified with YTS which it will be hard to break. Recommendations are made which include (a) a second year which is industry — rather than occupationally‐based; (b) unconstrained movement across OTFs in order to reduce a counterproductive bias in that system; (c) YTS should be financed by government and not by employers in order to combat uneven coverage of training endemic in the ‘voluntary’ system; (d) there should be an expansion of the ‘credentialling’ sector of YTS; (e) and/or an expansion of higher status places in the ‘contest’ sector. YTS is then set against current changes in MSC and government policy regarding education and training.     

A New Approach to Social Problems

Assuming that learning is an inherently social process, this research explores interpersonal variables that affect teaching. Specifically, does the interpersonal teaching style affect student impressions of the instructor? Eighty-five undergraduates viewed one of three ten-minute videos that portrayed either an authoritarian, authoritative, or neutral style. While the content remained constant, the videos differed in many ways. Students rated the authoritative style as most positive and the authoritarian as least positive. These results are consistent with socio-instructional theories of learning and imply that style is as important as substance in teaching.     

Matching Cognitive Styles to Computer-based Instruction: An Approach for Enhanced Learning in Electrical Engineering

An approach aimed at enhancing learning by matching individual students' preferred cognitive styles to computer-based instructional (CBI) material is presented. This approach was used in teaching some components of a third-year unit in an electrical engineering course at the Queensland University of Technology. Cognitive style characteristics of perceiving and processing information were considered. The bimodal nature of cognitive styles (analytic/imager, analytic/verbalizer, wholist/imager and wholist/verbalizer) was examined in order to assess the full ramification of cognitive styles on learning. In a quasi-experimental format, students' cognitive styles were analysed by cognitive style analysis (CSA) software. On the basis of the CSA results the system defaulted students to either matched or mismatched CBI material. The consistently better performance by the matched group suggests potential for further investigations where the limitations cited in this paper are eliminated. Analysing the differences between cognitive styles on individual test tasks also suggests that certain test tasks may better suit certain cognitive styles.     

An Approach to Teaching Electrical Energy

The paper discusses the implementation of a new teaching programme for electrical power engineering graduates. The balance between the different parts of the curriculum (non-technical, technical non-electric, electric non-power and real electrical power) is proposed and explained given the specific context. The logical information flow throughout the education process and the links between the course topics are explained.     

A Behavioural Approach to Teaching Subsidiary Physics to Engineering Students

A modified version of the Keller Plan or Personalised System of Instruction (PSI) was employed in a controlled experiment designed to evaluate the success of an innovatory behavioural teaching approach in Higher Education. Technology students studying subsidiary physics were randomly allocated to two groups. One group was taught under a traditional lecture format and the other under a modified PSI format. The PSI group were able to earn free time and bonus coursework marks for successfully completing fortnightly criterion tests. The results showed that fewer PSI students failed the course or passed with low marks and that overall their mean scores on the exam were significantly higher, by about 10%.     

环境工程实验室的绿色化管理

高校实验室是师生进行实验和科研的重要场所,同时也是产生与排放污染物最多的地方。这些污染物处理不当将会对环境造成严重污染。因此,实现高校实验室的绿色化管理是实验教学发展的必然趋势,已经成为新世纪实验教学人员研究的新课题。本文在分析环境工程实验室的现状基础上,从实验仪器管理、实验试剂管理、废弃物管理以及实验准备与方法几个方面探讨了环境工程实验室的绿色化管理方法,提出了针对性的管理措施,初步建立了环境工程绿色实验室,为今后环境工程类实验室的绿色化管理提供参考依据。     

A First Course in Electrical Engineering

This article describes the introductory two-semester course in electrical engineering that has been developed over a period of five years at Princeton University. The aims of the course are to provide an introduction to the field of electrical engineering via the basic concepts of electricity and magnetism (which are developed through Maxwell's equations in the integral form), to apply these concepts in developing the fundamentals of energy conversion and circuit theory, and to carry forward, in a continuous and integrated way, a modern treatment of network analysis. Thus, the treatment proceeds from field ideas to circuits and physical apparatus, and to their mathematical models. With the circuit relations formulated, attention turns to the analysis of networks, starting with network topology and extending through pole-zero ideas. The treatment stops just short of the Laplace transform. This course is intended to serve as a foundation for subsequent courses such as electronic circuits, energy conversion, and advanced network analysis and synthesis, and has been developed with the purpose of providing the student with a unifying point of view for these varied topics.     

《电工工艺》课程教学的探索

对电工工艺课程教学进行探索，具体内容包括：教学手段、教学方法、教学内容及考核方式方法等，目的在于使学生加深对电工工艺知识的理解掌握，使之与专业知识融汇贯通，培养学生的职业能力，提高教学质量。     

关于教育融资的新思路

教育是基础生产力，应优先发展。在财政投入不足的情况下，可考虑发行教育彩票加以补充。发行教育彩票对优化社会资源配置、促进国民经济发展、减轻财政分配压力、完善市场结构等具有积极意义。发行教育彩票不会造成不公平、不稳定和传统美德的还丧失。教育彩票筹资应主要用于高校扩招、扶持民族教育、补充“两基”工作投入的不足、补育国家对部分高水平大学和学科的投入、支持教育部人社科重点研究基地的建设五个方面。要增加彩票发行额度，单列教育彩票发行指标，在发行方式上要采用传统与现代相结合的方式，突破地区限制，实行跨区发行，并且加强发行管理。     

大学英语口语教学探讨

随着社会不断发展和经济全球化的日益深入,英语应用能力成为考量人才的一个重要指标。因此非英语专业大学生英语口头表达能力的培养成为英语教学的关键。较以往传统英语教学模式偏重读写能力的训练而言,新形势下的大学英语教学应给予口语教学充分的重视,调整口语教学在整个教学安排中的份量,所以研究并改革英语口语教学应作为大学英语教学改革的第一步。本文针对我国非英语专业大学生口语能力薄弱的现状,提出了在学生本身英语基础知识比较差的条件下如何改革,帮助学生拓展英语交际能力的思路。