Students perspective of the embedded engineering learning platform — A case study in digital design

This paper presents a case study on students´ perspective of the cross-curriculum embedded engineering learning platform in the Digital design principles course. The platform used is based on FPGA device which is programmed by students. As a measure of applicability of the platform, students´ feedback is used. At the end of each semester, students were asked to give feedback in the following: (1) understanding of the theoretical principles in digital design, (2) correlation of auditory and laboratory exercises with lectures, (3) organization and difficulty of laboratory exercises, (4) software environment used to design digital systems, (5) usability of the embedded engineering learning platform, (6) the influence platform left in making the course more comprehensible, less frustrating and easier to pass, (7) the amount of information given in the course literature, (8) the amount of time the course took in the students´ learning schedule, (9) course staff and (10) significance of the course in their future engineering work. The students´ feedback showed that the platform has met its goals and made the digital design principles course easier to understand, more interesting to students and increased the percentage of students who passed the course without lowering the difficulty of the tasks.