Jane Prey

Cooperative learning in an undergraduate computer science curriculum

As a discipline, computer science has seen many dramatic changes. The content of the curriculum has for the most part kept pace with these changes. However the pedagogy has changed very little. Most computer science instruction uses the lecture method as the exclusive means of teaching the fundamentals of the material and out-of-class programming assignments to ensure appropriate programming skills are developed. In most cases, students learn to write short programs from scratch, by themselves. Compare this with the real world where programs are thousands or millions of lines long, are often extensively modified and maintained rather than merely constructed, are manipulated in a tool-rich environment, where work is almost always a team effort, and where the form of a solution has profound impact on future cost and performance. This clearly illustrates the problem. There is a serious mismatch between what is taught, how it is taught, and the emphasis it receives on one hand and what the consumers of the education actually need on the other. The University of Virginia began an ambitious undergraduate computer science curriculum revision in 1992. We discuss how we incorporated a cooperative learning environment into our new curriculum.

Undergraduate computer science education: a new curriculum philosophy & overview

Computer science has changed rapidly in its brief history. What once were acceptable as skill and knowledge levels are now inadequate. Today’s computer professional must have an extensive set of skills and detailed knowledge of many technical areas. Similarly, the individual entering the research community needs a thorough grounding in many diverse areas. The intent of our new curriculum is to prepare these professionals and researchers for their careers following graduation.

Cooperative learning and closed laboratories in an undergraduate computer science curriculum

The incorporation of the closed laboratory in four of the seven core courses of the computer science curriculum has afforded the opportunity to implement cooperative learning as an approach to enhance student learning. Laboratory activities are designed to be worked by partners. The laboratory instructor is more of a facilitator, the students are their own teachers. The four course sequence enables us to develop the cooperative learning model slowly, a part in each course so that by the final closed laboratory course, students understand the benefits of cooperative learning and are very comfortable with workinglhelping their peers.

Software Engineering Beginning in the First Computer Science Course

The demand for computing and computing power is increasing at a rapid pace. With this demand, the ability to develop, enhance and maintain software is a top priority. Educating students to do competent work in software development, enhancement and maintenance has become a complex problem. Software engineering concepts are typically not introduced in beginning computer science courses. Students do not see software engineering until the third or fourth year of the curriculum. We do not believe students can acquire an adequate software engineering foundation with the present approach. We believe an emphasis on software engineering should begin in the very first course and continue throughout the curriculum. We are redesigning our curriculum to reflect this. The first course of the new curriculum is complete. This article focuses on two of the laboratory activities we have developed which deal with specific software engineering concepts.

Collaborative learning in undergraduate information science education (abstract)

Business and industty need employees who can work as members of a team. Most college and university experiences have not trained students to work together. This panel will discuss the approaches being developed to meet the needs of business and industry by providing students with the breadth and depth of knowledge they need to become productive professionals in information science. Haines will discuss proposed efforts to have students work on industrial projects as members of actual design and development teams. Mulder will discuss developments in information science curriculum following from the NSF Task Force on Information Science which reported at CSC ’94, Jane Prey and Doris Lidtke will discuss collaborative learning in the courses in which they are involved.

Now for the laboratory experience! The view from four different undergraduate computer science curricula

There is much discussion about the undergraduate computer science curriculum. With the rapid changes in computer science, the need to stay current is mandatory while the ability to develop and implement a contemporary undergraduate curriculum is extremely time-consuming and costly. Four schools have each developed a different model to undergraduate computer science education. Each school believes the work done has been successfully implemented at the respective institutions. They also believe that these works can be successfully adapted by others. An overview is given of the laboratory models and topics developed for a laboratory activity.

ACM SIGCSE NSF CCLI project showcase

We will be showcasing small groups of NSF DUE CCLI award winners in the exhibit hall throughout the conference. The purpose of the special session is to introduce all of the showcase projects to the conference attendees at one time. This special session will consist of: A brief introduction about the purpose of the showcase, Introduction of the NSF Program Directors present Short overviews of each of the showcase projects by the project PI We expect to showcase 15-20 new CCLI award winners. The showcase itself will be presented during various times each day in the exhibit hall. Please check the showcase schedule for exact details.

Four innovations to undergraduate computer science curricula

There is currently much discussion about the undergraduate computer science curriculum. With the rapid changes in computer science, the need to stay current is mandatory while the ability to develop and implement a contemporary undergraduate curriculum is extremely time-consuming and costly. The four schools represented on this panel have each developed a different model to undergraduate computer science education. Each of the authors believes the work they have done has been successfully implemented at their home institutions. They also believe that these works can be successfully adapted by others. The purpose of this panel is to present these four approaches and generate discussions on their commonality and their differences. With this discussion, they hope to help other schools who are interested in course and curriculum development. They can share their experiences, their curriculum models and their materials with others who are considering change.