Systems Thinking

The ability to use systems thinking to reduce complexity so that intricate products and situations are easy to understand is valuable in many aspects of design and technology in electronic product design.

Systems Thinking
Introducing
  • Understand that electronic circuits can take signals (information) from the environment, process them and produce further signals to send back to the environment.
  • Know that a circuit can be represented by a block diagram which will have the following elements:
    • Inputs
    • Processes
    • Drivers
    • Outputs
    • Electronic signals passing between the blocks
    • Signals passing between the system and the environment
Developing
  • Use system blocks as the basis for circuit design.
  • Know that ‘input’ blocks turn an environmental signal into an electronic signal.
  • ‘Output’ blocks turn an electronic signal into an environmental signal.
  • ‘Process’ blocks modify electronic signals (changing size, combining).
  • Understand that a signal coming out of a system can be used as an input into the same system and know that using a signal in this way is called 'feedback'.
  • Be able to identify feedback in a system diagram and be able to draw a system diagram that includes feedback.
  • Understand that feedback can be used to control an output e.g. Temperature control
Enhancing
  • Know that a signal in an electronic system corresponds to a potential difference (voltage).
  • Be familiar with a range of process blocks including logic, processing digital and analogue signals, counting, delays
  • Use system blocks as the basis for systematic circuit assembly; constructing and then testing one block at a time
  • Know that a fault found in a block has a limited set of causes that can be identified with supported fault finding.
  • Understand that there can be a hierarchy of 'system levels', with a subsystem at one level containing multiple subsystems at a lower level and being just a part of a system at a higher level.
  • Know that a signal that has only two conditions, e.g. light/dark, wet/dry, hot/cold etc., is a one-bit digital signal and can be represented by a voltage that is either near positive supply voltage or near 0V.
  • Know that a digital signal can be represented as a binary number: digital 1 (positive supply voltage) or digital 0 (zero volts) and is called a binary digit or 'bit'.
  • Know that a physical conditio that can vary continuously (called an analgoue signal) and is represented by a potential difference that can have any value between the positive supply and 0V.
Advancing
  • Use of feedback to achieve stability or convergence towards desired condition. E.g. position control, servo motors, speed regulation.
  • Understand that many (especially computer) electronic systems are digital; where analogue signals can be represented as a binary number. 
  • Know that digitised analogue signals can be represented as a binary number.
  • Know that the digitisation of an analogue signal leads to loss of information; increasing the number of digitisation levels (reducing the voltage between these levels) reduces the information loss.
  • Understand that the number of digitisation levels determines the number of binary digits (bits) required to represent the signal.
Science Links  
Maths Links
  • Understand and be able to draw and read a variety of graph and chart types.
  • Be able to select an appropriate graph for chart.
  • Be able to construct tally charts.
  • Be able to use flowcharts to represent a sequence of events or an algorithms.
 
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