Adding some spice to CS1 curricula

  • Authors:

  • Goefrey Holmes;Tony C. Smith

  • Affiliations:

  • Department of Computer Science, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand;Department of Computer Science, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

  • Venue:
  • SIGCSE '97 Proceedings of the twenty-eighth SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education
  • Year:
  • 1997

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Abstract

CS1 curricula that focus primarily on teaching programming skills may fail to give students a sense of the breadth of topics to which a knowledge of computability might apply. We attempt to correct for this by adding a survey of computing concepts into our introductory course. Sophisticated topics usually reserved for senior level courses are presented in a popular science manner, and given equal time alongside the essential introductory programming material. By exposing students to a broad range of specific computational problems we endeavour to make their first course more interesting and enjoyable, and instil in them a sense of vision for areas they might specialise in as computing majors.