Student use of personal digital assistants in a computer engineering course

Penn State Abington has integrated the student use of personal digital assistant (PDA) technology to foster active and collaborative learning experiences in the classroom and laboratory. Palm^TM PDA technology was introduced into a sophomore-level digital systems course in the fall of 2000. The students have investigated handheld software tools for enhancing learning and instruction in both the lecture and laboratory components of the course. Handheld databases, simple CAD tools, C programming, image capture, web-based tools, and robotics applications have been explored