Teaching Telecommunications Fundamentals A Networking Approach

As with many topics in a rapidly changing technical world, an introductory course in telecommunications and networking presents a challenge to curriculum developers. How does one teach fundamentals, such as frequency, bandwidth, and multiplexing, which change slowly and do not always appear important to the students? How does one teach contemporary networking topics in a way that is interesting to the “techies” while not losing the less knowledgeable? In addition, how does one bring all of the details of networking together as parts of a central theme so students come away with an overall sense of the field, rather than a collection of disconnected facts? This paper addresses one such attempt, that of transforming a “traditional” course, Introduction to Telecommunications, into a new course which is, in effect, an Introduction to Networking.