Real-World Data, Interactive Games and Data Structure Visualizations in Early CS Courses Using BRIDGES

Abstract

Grounding computer science concepts in real-world and socially relevant problems can be a key to increasing students motivation and engagement in computing. BRIDGES provides an infrastructure for use in early CS courses that allows students to easily integrate real-world data into their routine course assignments and visualize the data and data structures of their implementations. The BRIDGES API provides several key advantages, First, minimal effort is needed to accessing and using interesting real-world datasets in CS homework assignments. Available data sets in BRIDGES span multiple domains, including entertainment, science, geographic data, and literature. Second, BRIDGES can be used by students to create and explore a visualization of the data used and data structures implemented in their assignments. Such visualizations can be used to illustrate concepts of underlying algorithm or data structure, or important data features. Third, the BRIDGES Game API allows students to implement 2D games, to emphasize basic concepts, such as control structures, looping and logic, while providing a fun experience. Finally, students can explore the benchmarking of algorithms in BRIDGES by using real and large data sets, emphasizing algorithm performance and computational complexity. Workshop attendees will engage in hands-on experience with BRIDGES with multiple datasets and will have opportunities to discuss how BRIDGES can be used in their own courses.