Paper Authors

Abstract

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

Main Menu Session 1033

Teaching Computer Programming Courses (Using the Internet) in a Computer Laboratory Environment

Asad Azemi Department of Engineering Penn State University Delaware County Campus Media, PA 19063 E-mail: azemi@psu.edu

Abstract

The usual approach to teaching introductory computer programming courses is to have classroom lectures and small size supervised laboratory sections, where students will write simple programs reflective of the material that they have learned during the lectures. This approach can be im- proved by conducting the entire course in a “technology ready” classroom, where lectures and in- class exercises could be designed and delivered, in such a way, to promote an active learning en- vironment. This manner of conducting courses requires a larger investment, time and money, on the part of the institutions and instructors, than the traditional approach. This work describes our approach to teaching undergraduate computer programming courses in a computer laboratory en- vironment at the Delaware County Campus of the Pennsylvania State University. Our objectives have been to use the computer and communication technologies to build an active learning envi- ronment and a paperless approach in teaching programming courses using the Internet. This in- volves posting lecture notes and other related materials, such as course syllabus, quizzes, exams and grades, on the Internet and conducting the lectures in a computer laboratory. Steps taken to insure these objectives are presented. Finally, the advantages and disadvantages of conducting a computer programming course in this format will be discussed. This includes the instructor’s comments, challenges that are associated with this approach, possible solutions, and student reac- tions.

I. Introduction

The usual approach to teaching a computer programming course is to have a classroom lecture component and a supervised laboratory module, where students write simple programs reflective of the subjects that they have learned during the lectures. Although this approach may work very well for some subjects, it may not be the ideal way of teaching a computer programming course. Before getting to a more effective way of teaching computer language courses, let us consider the basic problems of teaching this type of subject material: (i) Although the incoming students have considerably more experience with computers than their

Proceedings of the 2002 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2002, American Society for Engineering Education

Main Menu

• Citation

• Format
  • APA
  • APA - LaTeX bibitem
  • MLA
  • MLA - LaTeX bibitem
  • Bibtex
  • EndNote - RIS

Azemi, A. (2002, June), Teaching Computer Programming Courses (Using The Internet) In A Computer Laboratory Environment Paper presented at 2002 Annual Conference, Montreal, Canada. 10.18260/1-2--10063