How Remote Labs Impact on Course Outcomes: Various Practices Using VISIR

Abstract

As technology is increasingly being seen as a facilitator to learning, open remote laboratories are increasingly available and in widespread use around the world. They provide some advantages over traditional hands-on labs or simulations. This paper presents the results of integrating the open remote laboratory VISIR into several courses, in various contexts and using various methodologies. These integrations, all related to higher education engineering, were designed by teachers with different perspectives to achieve a range of learning outcomes. The degree to which these VISIR-related outcomes were accomplished is discussed. The results reflect the levels of student engagement and learning and of teacher involvement. From the analysis, a connection between these two aspects was traced, although only related to the user profiles. VISIR is shown to be always of benefit for more motivated students, but this benefit can be maximized under particular conditions and characteristics.

Combined efforts to develop students experimental competences

“…It has been the understanding of several authors [7], [8], [13] the need for the development of well-designed didactical tasks in order to accompany students in their exploration of these tools and proper feedback in order for them to evolve. With the lack of contact time, students might be overwhelmed if teachers give them too many resources to freely explore.…”

“…Even though there is still some controversy in its efficacy in general [5], [6], [7], [8] teachers are tending to use it more often, either instead or as a complement to the traditional hands-on lab. Three factors also contributed to the growth of this usage: i) the growth of the number of students, specially a few decades ago; ii) the Bologna reform and the reduced amount of contact time between teachers and students [3]; and, iii) the more limited budget Universities have, which leads to too large classes and to very limited time for each student to really operate in laboratory with the equipment (too large groups implies that not everyone gets the chance to perform real work) [9].…”

The VISIR+ Project – Preliminary Results of the Training Actions

“…The only physical interaction between the user and the real equipment is through a computer interface (or more recently, a smartphone or tablet) which replicates a physical breadboard, showing all available components and the instrument front panels (Fig.1), which enables the user to connect the desired circuit and analyze its behavior with several instruments [14], [15]. The feeling of immersion in this remote lab is provided by accurate replication, either of the breadboard or the instruments front panels [8]. Dragging the available component with the mouse and positioning in the breadboard, replicates the action of grabbing a component with the fingers and mounting it in the breadboard, in real labs.…”

“…A remote laboratory is a real lab, in which the user and the physical apparatus are physically apart. To perform the experiment, the user has to access the Internet and usually a particular user interface to operate the remote equipment [8], being able to configure and control the physical parameters of a real experiment.…”

Using and Evaluating Remote Labs in Transnational Online Courses for Mechanical Engineering Students

“…In literature on established evaluation concepts for remote laboratories, the following sources could be identified as fitting to our context: Feisel and Rosa (2005) 17 , Rice University (2015) 18 Sundararajan and Dautremont (2014) 19 25 . Hence, these sources heavily inspired our evaluation model in its three differ- ing perspectives.…”