Electronics lab bench in a laptop: using Electronics Workbench/sup (R/) to enhance learning in an introductory circuits course

Electrical Systems, part of the Foundation Coalition Sophomore Engineering Curriculum at Rose-Hulman, serves as the introductory circuits course for students participating in the curriculum. The quarter-long three-credit course is designed to provide breadth in DC, transient, and AC circuits for all engineering majors. Rose-Hulman is in the second year of requiring entering students to purchase their own laptop computer, so this year each student in Electrical Systems has a 486-based laptop that can be used to support classroom activities as well as homework assignments. Electronics Workbench (EWB) provides an intuitive drag-and-drop user interface by which students can build a circuit, insert measuring devices such as voltmeters and ammeters, and click the "power switch" icon to simulate the circuit and see the results displayed immediately on the instrument panels. In effect, the student's laptop simulates an electronics lab bench. At the start of the quarter I spent zero class time lecturing about how to use EWB, yet students were able to productively use the simulator by the second week. In class the students experience circuit behavior as new concepts are introduced. Homework is structured around the design process: students "design" an analysis procedure, and verify their "design" with an EWB simulation. Survey results show that the students believe that the in-class simulations help them to better understand the concepts, and rate the tool highly in terms of its ability to help the learning process.