Integration of Virtual Instrumentation in the Teaching of Data Acquisition and Interface Systems Course

Abstract

This paper presents a case study of the integration of virtual instrumentation in the development of engineering projects in undergraduate electrical engineering education, regarding a Data Acquisition and Interface Systems (DAIS) course. The DAIS course is part of the undergraduate curriculum in electrical engineering degree of Federal University of Campina Grande (UFCG). This course is very important in the training of students who will work in the area of electronics, and uses LabVIEW as an educational tool to carry out practical activities. In the semester course, the teacher and the monitor followed up the student teams that proposed engineering projects to be developed during four milestones of the DAIS course. Statistical analysis of the collected data is done by semester course and by academic year. For each milestone, LabVIEW tutoring sessions and educational assessment are performed with student teams, who had great facility in learning the tool. In the final presentation of engineering projects, the students demonstrated domain about the content of the DAIS course and they were fully satisfied with LabVIEW. From the results, the students considered the virtual instrumentation tool with 96% of usefulness during the academic year and 100% recommendation to be applied in other engineering projects.