Case of Study in Online Course of Computer Engineering during COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Practical activities and laboratories, where the students handle hardware devices, are an important part of the curriculum in STEAM degrees. In face-to-face learning, the students go to a specific classroom where the hardware is available. However, laboratories are one of the challenges of distance education, due to the impossibility of the students attending classes at a certain place. This is especially relevant since the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks to the increase of students enrolled in distance education. Different approaches to tackle this problem have been adopted, ranging from mixed models where lectures are online but physical attendance to laboratories is required to purely virtual models where virtual worlds or augmented reality have been used to simulate the real hardware. This paper presents the case of study of a flexible laboratory for the use of Arduino in a Computer Technology course with 153 students, geographically distributed in Spain and Latin America. The goal of the case study is to study the impact of such a flexible laboratory in the course, based on four fundamental parameters: student access to the online lectures, participation in the course and marks obtained, and satisfaction surveys. The results show that students have increased their marks by 28.8% and their class attendance by 247.18%, doing more elaborate and complex work than in previous courses. Therefore, it is considered that they have satisfactorily integrated the knowledge acquired during the subject, and the projects with Arduino in Computer Technology have an impact on the flexibility and personalization of the education, motivate students and increase its educational productivity and effect on the quality of education, influencing the learning experience.