Implementing Hardware to teach Computing concepts

The overarching aims of our project were to inspire the next generation of computer scientists, through physical hardware exercises teaching core concepts.

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Presentation Overview

Following the EdTech brief, we decided to develop a teaching methodology in which we would use hardware such as Arduinos, FPGAs or Raspberry Pis to enhance the ways that school children can learn core computer science concepts.

I know for a fact that I was not at all interested in binary at that age and I feel that such a hardware relation would have increased my interest in computer science.

We developed in 3 core areas, but as it is just a proof of concept, we didn’t think it necessary to link all the sections.

  • Front-end Web Development with Swift app and React website
  • Cloud Computing with EC2
  • FPGA Development, designing a lesson that could actually be taught

Front-End Web Development

React Web App

The main functionalities for the web app are a dashboard with student names and statistics, a dashboard for the lessons that may be taught, with or without hardware implements. These lesson may also be generated with AI - we utilised the OpenAI API for generating text descriptions based on lesson titles, allowing for teachers to quickly ideate. The web app is for teachers.

Swift App

The main functionalities on this app are that the students can select a lesson, ask for GPT advice/generation and take part in the exercises with the hardware device.

Cloud Computing with EC2

We developed several different ideas for how we could implement EC2, as that is something a few of us have had experience with in our degree. This involved a lot of trial and error however, as the functionality we wanted was more complex than expected.

A high-level overview of our vision for this product would be that a client (such as a teacher/student device) could select a lesson, which would communicate with the EC2 instance, causing the relevant C code to be programmed to the FPGA, which could then be used to teach pupils core computing concepts with physical devices.

Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA)

As our team have entered for the “Application of Theory” category, we have introduced a hardware element into our project; the FPGA has been programmed to show Hex and Binary Code in switches, so students can experiment and learn.

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