At 23:45 -0400 9/7/03, Jeffrey Forbes wrote: >Hello all, > >For students who do most of their programming assignments >on their own computers, I am struggling to stumble upon >an appropriate method for helping the students with their >assignments. > >Instead of a "go to a computer lab for help" model, I would like to >employ some sort of a "virtual helper hours" model where students >could ask the course staff questions wherever the students >or the staff happens to be. > >I'd like to hear any advice or comments about how you have used >systems for this purpose. Some initial questions: >- Instant messaging systems (e.g AIM, Jabber, ICQ, etc.): are they > effective and appropriate? How should they be tailored for > virtual helper hours. >- Anyone had positive experiences using chat rooms for teaching > and consulting purposes? >- How about using a software package particularly for this purpose? > Does one exist? Is it any good? > >Please send any comments to me and I will summarize the results >for this list. > >Thanks, >Jeff > I've used a lot of these things with different kinds of success for each. One of the most effective tools is a mailing list to which everyone is subscribed. Everyone gets to ask questions. Everyone gets to see the answers. Most important, everyone gets to answer. This way questions can be answered 24 by 7 even if no instructor/lab assistant is available. You need to correct errors quickly, of course. I use the chat facility in AOL/IM to hold periodic chats in some courses and occasional/emergency chats in others. For example, I was ill once and missed a lecture, but held a "virtual" lecture using chat. You have to get used to running simultaneous multiple threads of discussion, though. Some find it hard to do. When I have a chat, I capture the entire chat as html and then publish it for the benefit of those who could not "attend." They are also helpful in adding a "personal" touch to an internet based course: where are you from -- what is that like... Finally, you should investigate a wiki, which is an interactive web site. Every visitor can edit any page. I spoke about this in a tips session at ITiCSE in Denmark a year ago. It is more permanent than either of the above and some things you do in one term can be easily carried to the next. Two features of my wikis (I have one for each course I teach) are AnonymousFeedback which is a page on which you can rant if you like, and other students can reply if they like, and a GrowYourOwnFAQ where you can ask questions that will be answered in a growing list. There are different wikis. I use a simple one (source code available from my front page) written in Java. There are others in perl, smalltalk, ... The original is the virtual home of the Patterns community http://c2.com/cgi/wiki. If you want to have a private wiki, however, keep it private and don't link to it. Otherwise you will get spam. We had this problem only once. My wiki has anti-crawler meta tags to help prevent this and it has been effective. BTW, you can also run a wiki at localhost and just use it as a personal multi-page note pad. Finally, information from the mailing list and the chats can be transferred to the wiki and really important stuff can be moved from the wiki to less volatile web pages, though you can make wiki pages read only as well. Hope this helps. Joe
computer science, cs21a, education
When I speak about computer programming as an art, I am
thinking primarily of it as an art form, in an aesthetic sense. The
chief goal of my work as an educator and author is to help people
learn how to write beautiful programs…My feeling is that when we
prepare a program, the experience can be just like composing poetry or
music…Some programs are elegant, some are exquisite, some are
sparkling. My claim is that it is possible to write grand programs,
noble programs, truly magnificent ones!…computer programming is an
art, because it applies accumulated knowledge to the world, because it
requires skill and ingenuity, and especially because it produces
objects of beauty. Programmers who subconsciously view themselves as
artists will enjoy what they do and will do it better. – D. Knuth
(Computer Programming as an Art. Turing Award Speech 1974)
From http://servlet.techscene.com/roller/page/xiao/20030906#quotes_galore
Caimlas is thinking of working on a conversation bot that can learn.
He found http://www.opencyc.org/ .
Ran across it while searching for Undernet #linuxhelp (http://www.xgoogle.com/details?channel=%23linuxhelp&network=222)
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/watches/5eec/
That is, like, _so_ cooooool.
That is, like, waaay cool.
(education)
I’ll need to give another quiz on arrays – make sure they know how to
declare, create and use arrays. They also need to pay attention to the
length part.
They also need to practice using loops to go over an array.
- Reverse an array
- Check if something is a palindrome.
- Add a number to the end of an array.
- Insert a number into the middle of an array.
- Print out every other item in an array.
heh, openwhatever is back in #linux, and nice and humble too. so "it" worked. * Coma clears a few bans then * sachac whistles innocently. you again, heh * Revenger hands sachac a red rose. * sachac hugs Revenger. sachac: you talked to him or what? OmiKrOn: thats our sachac allright. sachac: so, you're a hot teacher and a hot linux chick... neat! bag. sachac is a chixqu0r? *** ZEA (~zea@a213-22-224-121.netcabo.pt) has joined channel #linuxhelp cool, /me makes a note.
I can have the freshmen do this for tomorrow! =)
(good karma)
(person) are you a Psycologist?
(person) because I’m an arrogant self-righteous bastard and you’ve calmed me down a LOT quicker than anyone is usually able to. You have amazing people skills
(person) If you need a job, let me know, my company a has center in Manilla
(person) If that’s still where you are….anyway, thanks a lot
Alternative career? =)
This looks useful too! I wonder if it works in Linux…
http://www.hardwarecentral.com/hardwarecentral/news/4946/1/
http://www.iogear.com/products/product.php?Item=GME224M32
not websphere 5 for william, already downloaded.
How’s article doing?
Take a look at the Linuxjournal assignment and maybe think of writing about planner
Cross-platform Quake Lite thing
Not open source.
Tried singing. Stage fright.
New project: learn shamelessness. ;) Am quite amazed by fact that Andrei and Eric can… you know… just…