CREATION OF HYBRID VIRTUAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS
EXTENSION OF THE REMOTE AUTOMATION MANAGEMENT PROJECT (RAMP) TO ALLOW COLLABORATIVE DESIGN AND
PROGRAMMING OF A FIRST TECH CHALLENGE MECHATRONICS PLATFORM IN A VIRTUAL REALITY ENVIRONMENT
Principle Investigator: Dr. Kenneth J Ryan
Center for Automation and Motion Control
Alexandria Technical College
Alexandria, MN 56308
Project Team:
Dr. Jan Doebbert VP Student and Academic Affairs
jand@alextech.edu
Dr. Doebbert has extensive background in IT and Technology Management as
past Chief Information and Technology Officer at Alexandria Technical College.
He has been instrumental in all phases of the development of the Center for
Automation and Motion Control as its principle administrative liaison. He
currently serves as the administrative representative on the CAMC Board of
Governance.
Dr. Kenneth Ryan Director Center for Automation and Motion Control
kenr@camc-online.org
Dr. Ryan is the architect and director of the Remote Automation Management
Project at CAMC. He has been teaching advanced manufacturing automation and
at Alexandria Technical College for 11 years and along with his colleagues at the
Center has positioned CAMC as one of the premier 2-year automation programs
in the country. He is a Grants Trustee for the Society of Manufacturing Engineers
Education Foundation and National Visiting Committee chair of the NSF funded
Florida Advanced Technology Education Center of Excellence. In each capacity he
has ongoing networking and benchmarking opportunities and appreciates the
significance of emerging digital learning technologies and their potential impact
on technical education.
Mr. Jeremy Scribner CAMC Automation Technology Coordinator
JeremyS@alextech.edu
Mr. Scribner has been involved with the Remote Automation Management
Project since its inception. His degree in Computer and Voice Networking has
proven invaluable as the Center has implemented remote connectivity solutions
for the provision of controls and automation technology access to clients around
the world. His role in the current project will be as the networking technology
assessment and coordination specialist.
Amount Requested: $18,500
Project Summary:
The Center for Automation and Motion Control (CAMC) at ATC is actively engaged in the
remote training of advanced systems design, controls and automation. Currently six secondary
technology educators participate in weekly remote, real-time, interactive professional
development with instructors at CAMC. Topics include advanced automation and controls
programming as well as 3-D drafting using SolidWorks. Over 120 secondary students have had
access to advanced controls and automation training utilizing the Remote Automation
Management Project (RAMP) at the Center. The RAMP leverages the internet and Virtual
Machine technology to give high school teachers and students unprecedented internet access
to the advanced automation technology available at ATC.
In 2007 it was decided to investigate the use of virtual learning environments such as Second
Life to create a collaborative controls and automation design environment for high school
students. The objective is to provide advanced design tools (SolidWorks) to teams of two high
school students in each of 5 high schools across the state. These students would interact in a
virtual collaborative “design space” on the campus at MnSCU Island in Second Life. These teams
will constitute the only “virtual” First Robotics Challenge team and will design a robot for the
First Robotics Challenge in Q2-3 of MnSCU FY2008. We are asking for support to research and
develop tools for linking our VMWare “virtual machine” technology to virtual environments for
the creation of “virtual” design labs that leverage actual hardware labs in the Center for
Automation and Motion Control and elsewhere in the MnSCU system.
Objectives:
1) Teach students how to design collaboratively in a virtual environment
We will invite one pair of students from each of five high schools currently connected to
the Center for Automation and Motion Control, through the Remote Automation
Management Project (RAMP), to participate in a collaborative design project within a
virtual design lab. Students in these high school technology programs already have
remote access to advanced design and controls software maintained on virtual
machines configured using VMWare on servers at CAMC. These students will configure
and utilize a “virtual” design lab maintained on MnSCU Island for interaction with the
real world lab at CAMC.
2) Create a virtual lab in cyberspace that will allow these ten students to collaboratively
design a robot using 3D drafting software maintained at the Center.
At our facility we have used SolidWorks to model all of the parts for the Vex Robotics kit
used in the First Robotics Challenge.
http://www.usfirst.org/what/fvc/default.aspx?id=380
We have made this remotely available to students for learning how to use SolidWorks
by designing a robot for the First Robotics Challenge. We now hope to give learners
access to this 3-D drafting platform as a tool located in a virtual design lab. One of the
problems we face is connecting the learner to our server from a virtual environment
maintained on a server external to the learners PC. We need to research and develop
connectivity “objects” that will allow anyone to connect to any VMWare environment
from within any virtual learning environment such as MnSCU Island on Second Live or a
Croquet enabled environment.
We envision a connectivity object that I can pick up in the collaborative lab and be
connected with the SolidWorks session we were working on the last time we met in the
lab. This would resume my session and allow me to continue to work. If I requested that
the object “bud-off” another connectivity object I could hand this to you and we would
both be manipulating the same SolidWorks design environment while conversing over
VOIP about our respective goals for the design. We will leverage our preexisting
connections with programming SMEs within the MnSCU system to develop these
connectivity objects.
3) Create the virtual “space” that will house, and “tools” that will populate, this learning
environment.
We will need to develop space in the MnSCU virtual campus to house the lab
“equipment”. This equipment might be a large flat panel TV onto which the participants
might invite a subject matter expert (SME) to answer a question encountered during the
design phase of the project.
Example: If I have a question about how a servo motor works can I reach out and
“e-vite” a preregistered SME or learning object to appear on my virtual flat panel
TV at a specified date and time to answer this and other questions?
We will need to purchase expertise to develop these interactive objects for our “lab”.
Another tool would be a “projector” with which I could project the video I shot last night
of the robotic arm I designed and tested using my Vex robotics kit. If we had access to
the programming tool collaboratively we could then affect the behavior of the robot by
taking turns downloading our programs to it.
The common thread in all of these objectives is to research and develop the methods for
allowing access from one participants “virtual presence” to tools existing outside of the virtual
environment. We are asking MnSCU’s assistance in developing the first of these: the connection
from a virtual reality environment to a fully developed remotely accessible SolidWorks
application for collaborative design of a robot for the First Robotics Challenge.
Significance:
Potential impact on learners:
One of the most interesting questions for our team is: Given a configurable learning space, how
will learners direct their learning experience? We want to be prepared with the previously
mentions “connectivity objects” so that as learners ask for specific social networking tools… I
want to be able to share my video with others on MnSCU island… we will be prepared to offer
them that configuration.
Alexandria Technical College is a partner institution in The Minnesota 21st Century Learning
Project application to the MacArthur for just this very reason. We propose that by allowing
learners to craft their own learning environment we can assess its impact on problem solving.
We like the First Robotics Challenge because it represents a “problem” that has been
standardized nationally. We think this gives us good “Real Life” benchmarks for key
performance indicators in team behavior and design outcome metrics. In other words, are
there impediments to collaborative design (distance, lack of local SMEs, limited access to high
performance design applications…) that can be neutralized by use of a virtual learning
environment? These are some of the questions we hope to help answer through our
involvement with The Minnesota 21st Century Learning Project.
This request is for assistance in researching the key connectivity challenges that face us as we
attempt to create the platform for this collaborative design experiment.
The other critical component of our research has to do with the proper blend of “virtual” and
“real” in a traditionally hands-on activity such as that of designing, building, programming and
testing a robot. We at the Center for Automation and Motion Control propose that this will
eventually become a process that can be performed completely in the virtual environment.
However, this will require an evolutionary process from the current lab-based process to the
cyberspace of the future. This project seeks to create a hybrid learning model that leverages
current best-of-breed hardware technology with emerging virtual learning techniques and
social networking skills for collaborative manipulation of that real-world technology.
How will project deliverables add value to MnSCU?
As virtual learning environments emerge, learners will inform institutions how they want to
craft their learning experience. Innovators at Alexandra Technical College feel that digital social
networking solutions will continue to play a key role going forward. Research into open and
reusable connectivity objects which allow seamless learner to learner interaction while
incorporating institutionally based “power tools” and SMEs will allow MnSCU to flexibly
respond to the life-long, just-in-time knowledge needs of future generations of problem
solvers.
Evaluation:
The deliverables of this proposal are very focused.
1) Research and develop connectivity objects that will allow connection to specific
application software running on VM Ware virtual machine servers from any virtual
learning environment.
Success will be indicated by the implementation of a successful connectivity for any user
from Second Life and Croquet to the SolidWorks application hosted on a CAMC at ATC
remote access server.
2) Develop a collaborative design lab in MnSCU Island in Second Life to host collaborative
design team for First Robotics Challenge Q3 FY2008.
Success will be indicated by the existence of a learning lab with an object providing
connection to the SolidWorks design tools described in deliverable one. This lab will also
contain furniture and options for learners to use the connectivity tools to design the
robot for the competition.
Learners will also be able to share video with one another to demonstrate real-world
design progress made outside of the virtual lab.
Dissemination:
Connectivity objects will be made available as provided through CC with Attribution 3.0.
Objects will be made available on the CAMC web site www.camc-online.org .
All deliverables will be reported in presentations made during the First Robotics
Challenge as part of the promotion of the original Virtual First Robotics Challenge Design
Team.
Presentations will also be made in conjunction with events of the Society of
Manufacturing Engineers / Education Foundation who where the seminal funders of the
Remote Automation Management Project at the Center for Automation and Motion
Control at Alexandria Technical College.