Journal article
Stubbing
Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, Vol.17(3), pp.29-34
01 Feb 2002
Abstract
The Pennsylvania College of Technology offers two Information Technology curricula. Both curricula have a core consisting of a formal problem solving course, two semesters of programming and a course in data structures. Having had a formal introduction to problem solving and algorithms, students enter programming already predisposed to designing program solutions using structured modular design. The next step is to implement the structured algorithm in code.We present here an approach that allows students to implement an algorithm while remaining focused on the structure and design of the solution. The process necessarily introduces functions at the beginning and keeps the focus on the functions and their relationships to one another. This is a significant departure from the traditional paradigm of teaching syntax in the beginning and presenting functions and modular design late in the first semester. This also eliminates the necessity of having to "retrain" students to think in terms of functions and modules after half a semester of writing non-structured code. With this new paradigm, our experience has been that students ultimately become better designers, better coders and more self-sufficient than we have historically experienced.
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Details
- Title
- Stubbing
- Creators
- Sandra GorkaReza KamaliJacob MillerJohn Miller
- Publication Details
- Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, Vol.17(3), pp.29-34
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Management
- Identifiers
- 991019298756604721