Transforming Internet of Things Education Through Project-Based Learning: A Decade of Experience

Abstract

Effective Internet of Things (IoT) education requires students to integrate sensing, actuation, embedded programming, networking, and application development into complete cyber-physical systems. Achieving this integration remains challenging, particularly because students often enter IoT courses with widely varying backgrounds in hardware and networking. This paper presents a decade of experience in the iterative development of an undergraduate project-based IoT course and reports course evaluation results from four recent offerings: Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Spring 2023, and Spring 2024. The course adopts a three-stage project sequence consisting of (1) a single-node sensing and actuation system, (2) a network-connected IoT device using standard communication protocols, and (3) an open-ended capstone prototype, progressively scaffolding students from guided implementation to independent system design. We describe instructional strategies for addressing common implementation challenges, including hardware debugging, software toolchain configuration, and project scoping, and present representative student projects. Course effectiveness draws on anonymous pre- and post-course surveys together with rubric-based project assessment. Across all four offerings, students consistently reported high perceived learning gains, while final project performance remained strong across cohorts with different levels of incoming hardware experience. The course design, instructional framework, and assessment methodology provide a practical and adaptable example for project-based IoT education that can be readily adapted by other institutions to accommodate diverse student backgrounds and local curricular needs.