Project

Build Your Own Computer is a class I am teaching this Semester at the Georgia Center for Adult Continuing Education. The premise of the class is that students will be attending for the express purpose of learning to build and maintain their own computer. Students will learn about the various components of the computers, shop online or at local retail stores for components and purchase these components. They will then build their own computer in class. To facilitate learning some of the class objectives, an online learner support system and simulation is being developed to help the learners explore the complex interrelationship between all the components that go into building a computer.

This project consists of two components. The first component is a database-based decision support system that allows the learners in the class to learn about the various hardware components through the process of being presented various computer components and asking them to match the component appropriately against a list of choices. The student may be asked to either choose the one that’s definitely incompatible or choose the only one that’s compatible with the displayed component. There will be a series of approximately 10 questions in this component.

The second component consists of a simulation session in which the same database is utilized to allow the student to pick out various components and attempt to build a computer system from the available components in the database. When the student has assembled his computer, the simulation will analyze the compatibility of all the components as well as ensuring all critical components that make up a system have been selected and then tells the student whether he has built a working system or not. Should the learner build a non-working computer, the reasons for the incompatabilities discovered are listed and the learner is given opportunity to return to a prior step in the exercise to reconstruct the computer.

• Project Documentation
• Online Learner Support System
• Formative Evaluation
• ADDIE Documentation Model for Overall Course
• Learner Survey (MS-Word Doc)
• Technical documentation on how the system was built.