Cooperative/interactive learning system for logic instruction

An educational apparatus for teaching a plurality of persons the operation of a selected system and the operation of a plurality of different system elements of said selected system, said apparatus comprising:

• instruction means for describing the function of a selected system and the interconnection of said plurality of different system elements forming said system to a plurality of persons;
• a plurality of different system elements, wherein each one of said plurality of different system elements having individual function, and each one of said plurality of individual system elements being independently operated by at least one of said plurality of said persons, so as to teach the operation of each one of said individual system elements;
• and
• a plurality of interconnection means for interconnecting said different system elements to form said system by said plurality of persons, so as to teach the operation of said selected system.

An educational apparatus for teaching a plurality of persons the operation of a selected logic system and the operation of a plurality of different logic elements of said selected logic system, comprising:

• instruction means for describing to each one of said plurality of persons the function of said selected logic system, the function of each of said plurality of different logic elements forming said selected logic system, and the interconnection of said plurality of different logic elements forming said selected logic system;
• a plurality of logic devices, each of which corresponds to one of said plurality of different logic elements of said selected logic system;
• wherein each of said logic devices comprises a circuit board means, connection means for exchanging power, ground, control, and logic signals with others of said plurality of different logic elements, actual circuit components as appropriate for automatically implementing the function of the logic device's corresponding logic element, actuation means for accepting manual control input from at least one of said plurality of persons being assigned to said logic device for manually implementing the function of said logic device's corresponding logic element, logic operation mode selection means for choosing between automatically implementing and manually implementing the function of said logic device's corresponding logic element, control selection means for choosing between local mode selection based on said local operation mode selection means and global mode selection based on global control signals distributed to all of said logic devices, and
• means for displaying the state of said logic device's corresponding logic element including the states of any input signals to said logic element and the states of any output signals from said logic element;
• means for sending global control signals to all of said plurality of different logic elements;
• a plurality of interconnection means for exchanging power, ground, control, and logic signals between said plurality of different logic elements;
• and
• means for supplying power and ground to said plurality of individual elements.