An innovative top-down approach to teaching engineering courses

An innovative top-down teaching approach has been used for the first time in the Fall 2000 with a freshman electrical/computer engineering class using web and advanced technologies, such as: Blackboard learning software, Power point, Bisquare logic, Xilinx software, Omnipage Web, and Dreamweaver. Through the use of these technologies, more material was covered with greater understanding, greater participation among students, and with a sense of ownership and pride. In addition, the local engineering companies made more offers to those students for part time employment. The "Logic and Computer Design Fundamentals" a traditional sophomore or junior year course, has been taught for the last 10 years as a freshman level course at Florida Tech. With a generous grant from the F.W. Olin foundation, it became possible in the Fall 2000, to integrate the above-mentioned technologies to the-top down approach developed by the author during the last ten years