An Individually Paced Introductory Course in Network Analysis

This paper describes some results of a course in network analysis taught to all electrical and mechanical engineering sophomores at the University of New Hampshire. The report covers two years experience with the course. The first year (spring 1971) forty students took the course under an individually prescribed instruction approach (IPI) while fifty students were taught with the standard lecture-recitation method. The second year (spring 1972), all seventy students took the course under PI. Comparison between students in IPI and the lecture-recitation method by semester end test, a three month retention test, and performance in the next electrical engineering course indicate no significant difference in the material learned. A detailed questionnaire was filled out by each IPI student. Most significant were the responses that indicated that although most students considered the IPI approach to be more work, most preferred it to the standard approach.