2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

The best way to teach electric machinery is with hands-on labs. At the beginning of the Fall 2020 semester, due to COVID-19 concerns, it was unclear whether in-person laboratories were going to be allowed. As the semester drew closer, it was determined that we could have in-person labs, but we could only have one person per lab bench. Due to high voltages and rotating machinery on the benches, this would be a safety hazard. A compromise was reached and we were allowed to have two students per bench, but the students were required to wear face shields in addition to the required face mask and gloves. When running the lab in the past, all lab data, calculations, and discussions about the lab assignment were written on engineering data sheets (similar to industry). With the possibility of touch transmission of COVID-19, we switched to electronic forms. To do this we added input boxes into the existing lab handouts using Adobe Acrobat. The students then submitted their assignments via our Moodle-based learning management system (LMS). With forms created with Adobe Acrobat each of the input blocks can be assigned field names. You can then transfer the form data into an Excel spreadsheet. Once in spreadsheet form, you can create equations in Excel to quickly check the accuracy and appropriateness of the students’ data. Color coding was used to indicate when values were off by more than 0.5% to 5% of the expected value. The instructor could then determine if points should be deducted. If the error was small, it was simply noted with a comment on the student’s submittal. For larger errors, points were deducted using a rubric in the LMS created for each lab assignment. For the discussions, the text was also imported into the spreadsheet and the rubric was used to assign a grade. Both the lab handouts and the Excel spreadsheets have been used in subsequent semesters. This paper looks at the process to create forms from the lab handouts, creating the Excel spreadsheet to check the students’ data, the responses of the students to this type of lab assignment, and problems encounter with the implementation.