Tablet Pc Applications In A Large Engineering Program

A Tablet PC computing initiative was announced by Virginia Tech in summer 2006. Use of Tablet PC-based instruction was implemented in a freshman engineering course with about 1200 students in fall 2006. Examples of instructional activities included electronic note taking, use of inking features to review homework solutions and completing skeleton PowerPoint slides designed to increase the engagement level of students in a large classroom, and setting up online collaboration sessions to do group design project and problem solving activities. In addition, the Tablets helped students maintain an electronic log of their individual and group efforts in completing a 6-week long sustainable energy design project. A summary of assessment data from in-class clicker-based questions and end of semester course exit survey is presented to discuss the effectiveness of Tablet based instruction. Students liked electronic note taking features and quickly became proficient at setting up collaborative sessions using Tablet PC for design and problem solving activities and thought the Tablet PC was a good tool for that purpose.