tealsk12 / introduction-to-computer-science Goto Github PK

Link to Space Invaders video takes you to a youtube error screen that says the video is unavailable.

For project 1 and other unit 1 labs, the instructions in gitbook markdown are different from the pre-rendered PDF/word documents. Perhaps they haven't been updated since the markdown has been updated.

Updates and contributing --> link to "Contributing" page is broken.

https://tealsk12.github.io/introduction-to-computer-science/#introductiontocomputerscience/updatesandcontributions

https://tealsk12.github.io/introduction-to-computer-science/contributing.md.html.html <-- broken

We are on the Lab 1.1.1 Snap Begins. I do not have the answer key. Students are asking questions I can't answer. How do I get access to the answer keys for Intro to CS curriculum?

list --> sentence and for each blocks are ones you have to import from the "Tools" library. Please describe this process or refactor the do now to use default Snap blocks.

We link to a general Planning Worksheet in many projects and labs. Unit 2's Pong project even has a customized version of the planning worksheet specific to pong.

We should include the planning worksheet in the Project 3 descriptions (or even a customized version of it)

Hi Kenney,

Although you merged the newest Snap Tips file (attached) it seems that the error in Github when I attempt to download it. Maybe the error will go away tomorrow. If not, I can try to re-upload it and re-link it in the tips documents.

All the best,
Raquel

Remove the hard-coded due dates from the Project Description:

Required Checkpoints
Monday, October 27: Screens should be designed; the hero should be able to move and jump; gravity should work; reset button should be functional
Monday, November 3: Hazards and enemies should be present; death should work properly.
Monday, November 10 (final due date): Lives, power-ups, and victory should be implemented; all other required program components must work

A good deal of our links were authored early to omit their target component. These look like This is a [jump to some target] in the text. Some renderers will interpret this as [jump to some target][] (a deferred link using the link text), and other renderers will interpret this as regular text with square brackets.

For all links that do have deferred defintion, we should append the [] component to make the link nature unambiguous.

The Pong Project description (Project 2) in gitbooks gives directions about using custom blocks, but custom blocks are not introduced until Unit 3 for the Platform Game.

EMAIL FROM TEACHER:

Hi Lucia,

I hope you're doing well in these unusual times.

I wanted to share my thoughts on lab 3.03 for python. I was working on it myself so I'd have an idea of what difficulties the kids might encounter, and for the first time, I threw in the towel. I thought I could've done the lab using just one function, but to use two was driving me crazy. I checked the solution on the TEALS website, and thought 1) this was far too complicated for my students, and 2) the solution doesn't relate to the lesson because the the second function doesn't use the return value from the first function, so what was the point of having the first function return a value.

I don't know whether other teachers have had similar experiences, but my feeling is that in future years, TEALS may want to consider using a simpler lab instead. Just a thought.

Stay safe,

Jory

Somewhere in the updates, Snap! added a For loop. This should be part of lesson 2.1 which covers Forever, Repeat [], and Repeat Until [].

Lessons 2.2 and 2.3 do now's seem to be flipped in the wrong order.

we don't really talk about the purpose and importance of requirements documents to software engineers in the real world. (Or user stories for agile development teams.) That seems to be a bit of an oversight.

Received feedback from volunteer about aligning rubric to the instructions of the lab. Volunteer mentioned we should look into how we do this more consistently.

On page https://tealsk12.github.io/introduction-to-computer-science/lesson_35.md.html the line
Platform Game Project: Platform Game (Download in Word) (Link to PDF)
has two broken links.
The text Download in Word and Link to PDF are both broken links.

Screenshot of text with broken links:

Result of clicking on Download in Word or Link to PDF:

The link to http://www.nsrfharmony.org/system/files/protocols/chalk_talk_0.pdf# returns a 404 page.

It appears that there is a valid link here: https://www.nsrfharmony.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/chalk_talk_0.pdf

Says "2. Modify your code to draw two bricks side by side. The bricks should share a short edge, like this:"

Looks like it's missing an image. ​

Offering an alternate approach to lab 3.4. My goals for modifying the lab spec were:

• Providing clear directions about what each block should do. I added images of each custom block into the lab doc, as well as sample inputs/outputs for students to test on their own.
• Reinforcing that custom block implementations can leverage other custom blocks. The lab is designed for students to build on their work.
• Removing material on strings, which I hadn’t covered and wanted to keep out of unit 3.
• Showing something cool on stage. Labs 3.3 and 3.4 get away from using the stage, which might cause students who aren’t interested in just reporting values (it’s more abstract than most things they’ve done up to this point) to struggle or check out. Showing students the completed lab before they start could be a good hook and provides some context for the “low level” blocks they’re making in the beginning. Just make sure they follow the doc in order and don’t try jumping ahead!

Lab spec: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Upr82OzadeH69qq0kRpnpw2qU6GgRwhb4hbNXwcZtyw/edit?usp=sharing

Updates appear to have been made to the markdown pages that aren't reflected in the curriculum map.

• Pong and Platform Game appear to have been swapped in the course structure.
• Variables now appears to be a part of Unit 2.

It needs a sensible directory structure, and file references will need to be updated (for the GitBook materials).

The sample word guessing game listed on Lesson 4.6 does not seem to work for a few people on our team. Not sure if it's affecting everyone or just us.
http://www.searchamateur.com/Play-Free-Online-Games/Bubbletoonia-Cake-Deal.htm

There is another sample game that is listed on Do Now 4.6 that can be a potential replacement.

Make sure to replace ALL references to Hangman including Sample Code.

Sample Solution has been updated in the Additional Curriculum Materials.

The link to the Berkeley Snap! reference manual in the readme.md is broken.

Current link: http://snap.berkeley.edu/SnapManual.pdf

Correct link: https://snap.berkeley.edu/snap/help/SnapManual.pdf

Is there a reason that the "Snap Tips" document is a separate Word file? It seems like something we'll want to update and do version control on like the rest of the curriculum.

• https://tealsk12.gitbook.io/intro-cs/unit_2/lesson_22#sample-solution link if broken i.e. (404)

Suggest changing the two versions of the Platform Game project description so that the version currently labeled "Project 3" becomes "Project 3 Advanced" and the version currently labeled "Project 3 (Easy)" becomes "Project 3".

This way, students who do the simpler version will not feel put down.

Part 2.2 is written as follows:

Write a custom SNAP predicate block called “contains letter” that determines whether or not
a word contains a particular letter. You can consider upper-case and lower-case letters to be different for the purposes of matching.

However, the equals ( = ) block in Snap! does a case insensitive comparison so shouldn’t the last sentence be "You can consider upper-case and lower-case letters to be the same for the purposes of matching."

I suggest updating the project so that it is more inclusive of TEALS BC schools. Students can create an animation of how a city/town name in North America came to be (instead of State/city/town name in USA). Or even open it up for city/town names from other countries in the world. Our students that come from immigrant families could research a city of their home countries.

6.3 lacks samples for the steps of project development. Teachers are specifically requesting examples of "scenarios" and "wire framing" as they relate to this project.

Under Instructor's notes, there is a broken link to a "Sample project solution." I'm assuming this is because solutions are accessed through the Dashboard. Remove link completely?

Logging here the bug in Lesson 2.4 - the link to the Planning Document is correct in the markdown file: https://tealsk12.gitbook.io/intro-cs/unit_2/lesson_24 but is incorrect in the Word Doc and PDF. Correct link the md file is: https://tealsk12.gitbooks.io/introduction-to-computer-science/content/SNAP%20Program%20Design%20and%20Planning%20Worksheet.docx.
Word Doc and PDF need to be updated.

Links to the Student Experience Survey actually link to the Lab assignment links. I'll submit a PR shortly with a fix.

https://tealsk12.gitbooks.io/introduction-to-computer-science/content/Projects/Projects%20Word/Project%202%20Platform%20Game.docx

https://tealsk12.gitbooks.io/introduction-to-computer-science/content/Projects/Projects%20PDF/Project%202%20Platform%20Game.pdf

Both refer to Project 2; should be Project 3

Snap lessons 3.3 and 3.4 need to be switched and the 3.3 lesson could use an update.

https://tealsk12.gitbook.io/intro-cs/unit_0/lesson_01

Under "materials", click on "Unit 0 tips", This points to a page in Gitbhub rather than in GitBook. I suspect there may be similar links in other lesson plans and units.

The BJC video suggestions in Unit 2 don't seem to line up with the topics. Perhaps this is an artifact of when we swapped unit 2 and 3 projects?

• Lesson 2.1 is about loops, but videos are about functions
• Lesson 2.5 is about Booleans, but video is about history of video games and designing casual games
• Lesson 2.6 is about combining loops and conditionals, but video is about video games
• Lesson 2.7 is the pong project, but video is recursion (spelled wrong)

Lesson 2.6 supports the Platform Game project, not pong. In fact there is even a reference to the platform game project. Consider moving this lesson into Unit 3.

The planning worksheet is not linked in the lesson.

Do now 2.5 has the first question written in a way that doesn't align with how material is taught.

1. It uses the term "objects" when we don't use that term in the curriculum. In Snap we say "values" when referring to what is represented by variables.
2. It uses a Python-esque syntax -- the equals sign = is used to assign a value into a variable when we have only seen = as an equality comparison operator in Snap.

Also, the variable names and values seem a bit random without any context, but that's a quibble.

A suggested alternative is below.

Write an algorithm, in English, for how you would swap the values in two variables.
For example, suppose we have two variables that have different values:

set [picnic item 1] to "water"
set [picnic item 2] to "melon"

How would you swap the values so [picnic item 1] has "melon" and [picnic item 2] has "water"? Here, "water" and "melon" are just examples -- suppose the algorithm doesn't know what values the variables have before it begins.

Since Gitbook updated, this no longer works: "The Introduction to Computer Science GitBook can be printed by navigating to https://www.gitbook.com/book/tealsk12/introduction-to-computer-science/details, clicking the "Download PDF" in the upper right corner, and selecting the pages to print."

NY/NJ RMs need to be able to print this this week.

public-intro-cs is redundant, as introduction-to-computer-science is the public repo. This probably needs to happen after issue #44.

After this, shut down the public-intro-cs repo.

The Unit 1 Quiz link gives a 404 Error. it's a link to a "Unit 1 Quiz.docx" but it's broken