The Assignment Designers of a course of instruction in Engineering decide that they can develop an interesting assignment by asking a team of students to design a system that can mimic the performance of the human ear. They discover a complete simulation of the ear is available together with course components developed for use in courses in basic anatomy and histology. The anatomy course offers a series of tutorials illustrating both basic concepts and detailed descriptions of each feature. All are illustrated with the simulation.
Experts are available to support the course.
The artificial ear will be tested by presenting it with sound at a variety of frequencies and volumes and measuring the signals emerging into auditory nerves. There is no reason to grade this effort since the students would know by listening whether their ear worked or not. They use the tool to give the assignment to a group of students, with a designated team leader. The design tool also allows connecting a student and group monitoring system to the assignment. This allows tracking of individual students and the group as a whole.