Teaching Embedded System Design Among K-12 Students Based on Trees-Forest-View Methodology

Embedded system design is a complex engineering process and embedded system and product is becoming a common and critical part in industry and everyday life. Learning embedded computing is recognized as an essential skill for all students at an early age to develop in order to be competitive in an increasing digital world. Teaching embedded system design among students at an early age is getting more and more important. However, because of the complexity of embedded system, teaching how to design it is a challenging topic for undergraduate and graduate students in college. Apparently it is even more challenging and interesting how to introduce this topic with hands-on projects among K-12 students. In this research, a trees-forest-view methodology is introduced and embedded into two newly developed courses as a step-by-step way to get K-12 students to enter embedded system design world. Research and experiment results show that this methodology inspires big interest and achieves great feedback among a group of K-12 students.