Dave Tompkins :: Teaching :: 2020 Spring :: CS 100

Dave Tompkins :: Teaching :: 2020 Spring :: CS 100 - 081

Course Description:

CS 100: Introduction to Computing through Applications

Using personal computers as effective problem solving tools for the present and the future. Effective use of spreadsheets to process, manipulate, and visualize numeric and textual information. Introduction to the Internet, World Wide Web, HTML, and XML. Algorithms underlying the functional components of web search engines and their influence on data access. Using wikis to publish, reshape, and organize data collaboratively.

Dave's Comments:

Coming soon...

Teaching Evaluations:

Number of Respondents: 47 / 252 (19%)

Course Organization

The learning outcomes for this course were clearly identified.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	1	2	30	14
	2%	4%	64%	30%

The course materials and activities helped me to understand the course concepts.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	1	11	20	15
	2%	23%	43%	32%

The course introduced an appropriate amount of new material.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	1	2	26	18
	2%	4%	55%	38%

The course content was well-organized and clearly explained.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	2	7	26	12
	4%	15%	55%	26%

Assessments

The intended learning outcomes were assessed through my graded work.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	4	10	23	10
	9%	21%	49%	21%

The assessments contributed to my learning.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree	No Basis for Rating
	2	7	22	16
	4%	15%	47%	34%

The way in which the course material prepared me for the assessments was fair and appropriate.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
1	9	12	18	7
2%	19%	26%	38%	15%

Feedback on assessments was provided within a reasonable timeframe.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
1	3	7	25	11
2%	6%	15%	53%	23%

Feedback on assessments contributed to my learning.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
2	8	7	22	8
4%	17%	15%	47%	17%

Environment

The course environment was supportive and helped me to learn.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	1	14	20	11
	2%	30%	43%	24%

The course personnel were helpful to students seeking assistance.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
	2	12	17	16
	4%	26%	36%	34%

My interest in this topic was stimulated by this course.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
1	1	13	22	10
2%	2%	28%	47%	21%

The course material and course personnel encouraged me to be engaged with the course.
Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
2	1	15	23	5
4%	2%	33%	50%	11%

Time Spent

On average, how many hours per week did I spend on this course?
0 to 5	5 to 10	10 to 15	15 20	> 20
10	29	7		1
21%	62%	15%		2%

Question-Specific Comments:

The course materials and activities helped me to understand the course concepts.

[Disagree] I found in more than one instance that examples were used as the sole explanation for a concept rather than acting to supplement an explanation. For example with NAT, I could recite the scenario used involving the doorman and the various addresses but in the content, this was literally never connected to what it means in terms of computer hardware which I found were frustrating especially when it was an assignment question.

The course content was well-organized and clearly explained.

[Agree] sometimes words/concepts were bolded but no clear definition of them was given

The way in which the course material prepared me for the assessments was fair and appropriate.

[Disagree] I found myself having to google and reach out to other sources due to the fact that many concepts either weren't covered in class, there wasn't an adequate explanation, or there were not strong enough examples to supplement the explanation for me to truly understand a concept.
[Disagree] Overall, I enjoyed the assignments and found them quite fair. I found the midterms much more difficult than the assignments, however, which came as a bit of a shock during testing.

Feedback on assessments contributed to my learning.

[Agree] - always long delay after grades came out of when access to see questions (and which we got wrong) was avaialble

The course personnel were helpful to students seeking assistance.

[Agree] TAs were very kind and responsive but not always available during their designated office hours and sometimes ill-prepared to answer questions (i.e. had not reviewed the material)
[Neutral] I only connected with course personnel once as I found it rather frustrating that office hours were only offered as a chat window within Microsoft Teams. I don't understand why the course admin though that a chat would be beneficial when compared to emailing back and forth because they are essentially the same thing. I would've preferred to have a face-to-face conversation or at least a voice call. I didn't find the chat was any more efficient or helpful than emailing. HUGE let down!

Open Ended:

Note: This is a complete list of comments I received, listed alphabetically to avoid bias.

The most important thing I learned in this course was:

basic knowledge of computer science, which can be applied in everyday life
Different excel functions
Everything!
excel
excel and HTML
excel and HTML
Excel spreadsheet
How a computer worked.
How computers work
How to do coding and make webpage.
How to do HTML
How to properly use some of the excel functions and combine them.
html
Html
HTML and CSS
HTML Coding,
I learned more about Excel functions which may benefit me if I so choose an entrepreneurial or research route in the future.
I learned so many useful skills for excel that I have used in other courses as well
I really enjoyed learning about Excel functions!
More advanced Excel functions, coding
My general understanding for how a computer works, and how a computer interacts with others, and through the internet.
Some tricks to maintain privacy
the basic functions of CS and some knowledge and understanding of how things work. It gives me some insight on how to operate on a few things
The basics of Computer Science.
the basics of html coding and how it applies to visiting websites in regards to my personal understanding of it
the behind the scenes of everyday use of html and our computers.
The most important thing I learned in this course would be the additional functions in Excel.
Time management, and HTML and CSS

What helped me to learn in this course was:

assignments
- assignments
Content modules and examples given from the videos
google helped me. things were sometimes not detail enough where if something that didnt work, there was no troubleshooting explanation or example to help us know the tricks or things to get around it.
I like how in the Excel unit answers were provided in the assignment which helped to clarify what a question was specifically asking for.
I think the way it was structured which just the right amount of assignments made the course easy to manage and absorb new information.
Interesting video dialogue
module notes
My previous interest in the course topics
N/A
Part B of assignments were fun
Professor Tompkins Videos and actually applying the methods taught in an assignment.
the assessments geared toward ensuring an understanding of the course content
The assignment part C
The assignments
the assignments
The assignments.
The examples
the lecture material
The mixture of audio and written notes, regular deadlines for the frequent assignments
the notes and assignments
The reading material was fair enough to study with as well as the aid of the helpful TAs.
The structure and clear explanation it was given in the course.
the videos for the modules really helped! TAs were amazing as well!
Using outside resources as well like the excel guide
watching some videos online helped me to understand the concept.

What changes, if any, would I suggest for this course?

all the youtube video are little fast and although it includes all the materials but need to be little slow and more clear
better organization and marking scheme
Do not make the excel mid-term that long with a dropbox component
Doing readings for the majority of the course work isn't very engaging and is hard to get through. I would recommend more video lectures and the addition of synchronous face-to-face office hours.
Early updates on late days would be helpful. So would an earlier release of mister instructions.
I understand we're all in a different time for teaching, and this is the first time this class has had online midterms but they were very unreasonable as they were too long and expected too much from students in such a short amount of time.
I would love to see all the modules have lecture videos instead of readings.
I would make the midterms easier or give more time to do them.
I would suggest shortening the midterms. Also, I felt that the content on the assignments was fairly representative of the content we learned, but the midterms were not. I felt that the midterms were not as fair as I anticipated as the content itself wasn't difficult but I felt like I was learning during my midterms because some of the material on it was not covered in the modules. I understand "thinking" type questions, but to place in content that requires knowledge to answer such as on midterm 1, or using a brand new function such as "LEN" during a midterm I would say is not fair.
I would suggest wording the midterms/assignments or the excel assignments with more clarity. A lot of the issues I had with the assignments were the unclearness of what is being asked when answering a question.
I wouldn’t make any changes.
increase the time allowed for the midterms
midterms
Midterms entirely on Learn. I struggled with downloading the templates and getting them uploaded in time and it added a lot of stress
More clearly walk through examples and videos of how to use BBEdit for HTML/CSS (there should be videos for these sections like how there was for the excel sections)
more content in the css module, faster marking/feedback for multiple choice assignments, fairer midterms
more office hours, shorter midterms
More time given for midterm evaluations (that require you to submit an assignment.
N/A
None
Please allow us to see what questions were wrong in Part A of assignments.
provide enough work or examples that we are able to be familiar with the content and be able to troubleshoot things
Provide more indepth feedback for assignment part C and allow us to see what the right answers were for the quizzes.
shorten the midterms
The html modules could have videos to better understand
The TA I had an experience with read my messages at one point and did not respond for hours, even ignoring my messages. I would at least expect them to say, "I cannot speak to you right now I suggest you message the other TA" or "I cannot answer this question for you" A little respect goes a long way... and there were barely any practice questions, especially for midterm 1, which in my opinion made me feel ill-prepared for it. So I think more practice questions would be beneficial, especially if the midterms are being made harder since it's open book.
- time period lengths of midterms
- fewer "tricky" questions that don't actually assess any knowledge or understanding
- distribution of load throughout the weeks (some weeks were really heavy, and other unusually light)
When it came to post mid-term 2.. Add some videos for CSS and HTML.

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