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CIS110 • Introduction to Computers
Catalog Description
This course introduces computer concepts, including fundamental functions and operations of the computer. Topics include identification of hardware components, basic computer operations, security issues, and use of software applications.
Official description from the Combined Course Library of the North Carolina Community College System. 3 credit hours, 2 class hours and 2 lab hours.
What the Course Covers
Windows 11, then Outlook and Teams, then Word, Excel, and PowerPoint in turn, then a run through digital literacy - the web, hardware, operating systems, cybersecurity, digital media, app and web development, networking, digital communication, and digital transformation. It finishes with Microsoft Copilot and the ethics of generative AI.
This is the broadest course I teach. It assumes nothing, and it's the one most likely to change what you can do at work next week.
Courseware, Not a Textbook
Instead of a textbook the course uses Cengage MindTap, with the readings, SAM trainings, capstone projects, and skills exams built into one interface and linked from your LMS.
You're in Central Piedmont's IncludED textbook access program unless you opted out, which means the charge is already in your tuition and fees and the bookstore sends you the access code. Don't buy anything else until you've checked.
How the Work Breaks Down
- Readings and SAM trainings for each module, worked through in MindTap. Individually small; collectively they add up fast, and skipped ones are the most common reason a grade drifts.
- Capstone projects for each application. These count for the most per hour of any work in the course, and you can retake them. A few minutes lifting an 80 to a 100 is the best deal you'll get.
- Skills exams on the digital literacy modules.
- Attendance quiz each week.
- Personal journal entries plus replies to classmates, and work logs whenever you sit down to work.
Journals and Work Logs work here the way they do in every course of mine - the journal is its own board, the work log is another, and each has its own format.
The Honors Journal
CIS110 adds one thing the other courses don't have. If you're taking the course for honors credit, an honors journal runs alongside your personal journal - same format, separate board, and it doesn't replace the personal one. You keep both.
Where to Look
Your LMS has the due dates and the point values. The CIS110 FAQ answers what students ask most. Assignments lists the sequence, and the Schedule numbers the weeks of the term. Course Standards covers how to work in any course of mine, and the AI policy tells you which of four levels each assignment sits at - worth reading early in a course that ends by teaching you Copilot.