Implementation of a Virtual Mechanics Laboratory for a first year undergraduate engineering subject using MATLAB App Designer

Abstract

CONTEXT In wake of the COVID-19 situation in 2020, when universities were faced with the transition from face-to-face learning to online delivery, many educators found themselves tasked with having to convert previously classroom-based teaching material to an equivalent online adaption. The transition was particularly challenging in a first-year engineering subject where hands-on laboratory experiments play an important part in the learning of basic mechanics principles as a foundation in engineering. Adaptation of physical hands-on experiments into the form of interactive virtual simulations was necessary to ensure students had an equally comprehensive laboratory experience in the online delivery mode. PURPOSE This paper describes the development and implementation of a virtual laboratory for a set of mechanics experiments as an alternative to the physical hands-on laboratory. The interactive simulation application replicates the procedures of a physical mass-spring system investigation that applies two fundamental mechanics concepts, resultant forces and principle of moments. APPROACH The virtual laboratory application is a user-friendly graphical user interface (GUI) integrated with a program code that models a physical spring system, developed in MATLAB App Designer. Key features of the application include animated outputs and virtual measurement tools that emulates the procedures of the actual experiment and MATLAB modelling that takes into account inconsistencies that may arise in real measurements. For deployment purposes, the simulation program in App Designer was compiled into a standalone executable and run using the MATLAB runtime environment. OUTCOMES The virtual laboratory activity was successfully conducted during the online workshop classes in the first-year engineering subject at the University of Melbourne across a cohort of over 600 students. The simulation application in the virtual setting achieved similar learning outcomes as the experiments in the physical setting, but the activity was completed in significantly shorter times as compared to the expected physical hands-on. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS The virtual experiments offered efficiencies over physical experiments in terms of minimising experimental procedure delays and allowing more focus on concepts and theories but unavoidably compromising other hands-on experience such as equipment set-up, calibration, real-world experimental observation, and troubleshooting. For a more comprehensive virtual laboratory experience, future work to model the virtual environment more accurately to represent real world behaviour is recommended.