Mobile and wireless networks course development with hands-on labs

Abstract

Rapid advances in wireless networks technologies present opportunities for innovative education at undergraduate and graduate level. Wireless networks courses become increasingly popular in colleges (including community colleges) and universities. However, there is a real concern with the lack of hands-on labs based active learning in computer science, engineering and technology curriculums. Hands-on project based learning is found to be the best way of learning and teaching wireless networking technologies. These hands-on projects also provide the problem based learning (PBL). In this paper, an undergraduate computer information technology special topic course in mobile and wireless networks is presented which is developed based on many hands-on lab activities. In learning the concepts of wireless networks via hands-on labs, students get ample opportunities to understand the underlying principles and concepts of wireless networks. These hands-on labs are chosen to provide sufficient challenges to the students that prepare the engineers and technologists for the next generation solutions. The level of difficulty for this course requires the prerequisites of networking course. For each hands-on lab, each team of students carry out the lab activities in order to successfully implement the particular wireless networks solutions. The course requires the students to collaborate among them and participate in active learning based modules. This paper elaborates innovative projects that are suitable for laboratory work in computer information technology curriculum. It explores both hardware and software components that are now being used for practical exercises in wireless networks courses. This paper discusses the hands-on labs for wireless networks such as site survey, MAC (Medium Access Control) layer settings, upgrading the firmware of wireless devices, etc. In addition, this paper also illustrates the wireless security labs which discuss how to set up WPA/WPA2 (Wi-Fi Protected Access) on Cisco and Linksys wireless access points (AP). © American Society for Engineering Education, 2010.