A Ubiquitous Smart Learning Platform for the 21st Smart Learners in an Advanced Science and Engineering Education

Abstract

Many people from various sectors are now talking about "Smart" and "Ubiquitous" things for workplaces, homes, school classrooms, and so on. Terms of ubiquitous and smart are another words for everywhere and intelligence. Ubiquitous smart learning can be defined as a quite innovative way of getting the knowledge, especially in advanced science and engineering areas. Ubiquitous learning environments are always connected with WiFi, 3G and 4G and provide a learners' paradise where they can learn anywhere and anytime whatever they want to learn. In this paper, we have developed a computer simulation-based ubiquitous smart learning system called EDISON (EDucation-research Integration through Simulation On the Net) for supporting users in the area of CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics). The EDISON system could be used by the curious learner, much like Thomas Alva Edison who lived in the 19th century and liked to do all kinds of experiments to verify or discover answers to his curiosities or to solve problems. We, as smart learners, who are living in the 21st "smart century" can do many experiments like those done by Edison through computer simulations in a ubiquitous smart learning environment using EDISON. In addition, we have explained in detail how we have been motivated to develop the EDISON system, what kind of functionalities and architecture it has, how we have improved the performance of the EDISON system in terms of system's stability, response and waiting times, and how we plan to expand our system in the future.