Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
to use the debugger in the classroom, and JBuilder was used in class throughout the term
for demonstrating programs as well as writing, compiling, and running new code examples.
A review of several textbooks led to the selection of “Computing with Java: Programs,
Objects, and Graphics” by Gittleman (2001). This topic was chosen due to its in-depth
coverage of critical course concepts, the clarity of its text, and its frequent and easy to follow
code examples.
Students were also provided with weekly lecture notes, available from the course Web
site (http://cis.bentley.edu/cs603/wlucas/web603). These notes, which were projected dur-
ing lectures, limited the amount of writing students needed to do. Students could therefore
focus on understanding the concepts being discussed and on working through the many
programming problems presented during the class.
In addition to lecture notes, the course Web site provided access to all assignments and
individualized grades and comments on those assignments, source code for programs written
or discussed during the lecture, and links to relevant sites, such as Java's class libraries. The
site was created specifically for this course, following the design used successfully in
previous courses (Lucas & Frydenberg, 2000).
Course Organization
The course was organized as a weekly two-hour and 15-minute lecture with 10
programming assignments, a midterm exam, and a final exam. Lectures followed the topics
covered in the text and in the notes that students printed from the Web site prior to coming
to class. These notes included sample code along with related problems to try in class. Some
of these problems were worked on individually, while others were tackled by the entire class.
In addition, a practice problem was distributed during each lecture for students to work on
individually. The instructor would walk around the classroom to see the various approaches
being taken and to speak with the students. Then, either the instructor (earlier in the term)
or a student (later in the term) would type a completed solution into the classroom computer
using JBuilder's editor. Everyone would watch to see if the code compiled and ran correctly.
It was often most educational when one of these processes failed and the class would have
to determine how to correct the errors. The instructor was also able to comment on the
effectiveness and efficiency of the various approaches taken by members of the class.
The primary purpose of the 10 programming assignments given throughout the 15-week
course was to reinforce the concepts covered in the lecture and written materials. Assign-
ments were to be completed on an individual basis, with stiff penalties imposed for failure to
comply with the stated and posted academic honesty policy. Rather than discussing
assignments with others in the class, students were strongly advised to seek the help of lab
assistants for questions involving syntax or environmental issues, or the instructor for more
complex questions.
The first seven assignments were one week in length and were primarily logic intensive.
Short, focused assignments forced the students to stay up to date with the material and to
put into practice what they had been learning. For the first assignment, students were required
to use Sun's Java™2 SDK software from a DOS shell program along with a text editor of their
choice. This exposed the students to the concepts of compilers, byte code, and the JVM. Help
facilities within this environment are limited, and compiler and runtime errors are often difficult
to interpret. Students were then required to complete the second assignment using JBuilder.
Subsequent assignments could be completed using the environment of their choice.
