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ITSC1110 • Introduction to Computer Science Principles
Catalog Description
A broad-based introduction to key concepts and principles of computer science. Exploration of seven big ideas of computing: creativity, abstraction, data, algorithms, programming, the Internet, and impact of computing.
Official description from the UNC Charlotte Catalog. 3 credit hours. Satisfies the Quantitative/Data Competency general education requirement in Mathematics and Logical Reasoning.
Four Things Make Up This Course
Three of them are on Khan Academy, and the fourth is web development work I assign directly.
- Growth mindset, and a CSP pre-test. Short activities about how learning actually works, plus the Computer Science Principles course challenge taken cold. The pre-test has no grade - it's there so you and I can both see how far you've come.
- The full CSP curriculum, ten units, ending in the same course challenge taken again. That attempt is your graded midterm.
- Programming with JavaScript and the web, where the principles turn into pages that run.
- Web development assignments from me, built on your own site rather than inside Khan Academy.
Do every piece of Khan Academy work from the assignments page of the correct Khan Academy course. Work done anywhere else on the site - browsing to a unit directly, or through a different course - is invisible to the script that moves grades into Canvas. It will look finished to you and missing to me.
Joining the Three Courses
Canvas has a join code for each of the three Khan Academy courses. Join all three at the start of the term, and check that each one appears in your Khan Academy account before you begin any work. Joining late is the most common reason a completed unit doesn't count.
Grades Take 24 To 48 Hours, and Why That Matters
Khan Academy scores don't flow into Canvas on their own. We move them by hand, and we aim to do it every 24 to 48 hours - so finishing a unit won't change your gradebook that afternoon, and it shouldn't worry you when it doesn't.
But if 48 hours pass and work you know you finished still doesn't appear, contact us straight away. The usual cause is work completed in the wrong Khan Academy course, where no sync can ever find it - and the only fix is doing that work again in the right place. The longer you wait to ask, the more of it you'll have to repeat.
What Counts for a Grade
- Pre-test - ungraded. Take it without studying; a low score is the point.
- CSP units and the course challenge - the challenge is your midterm.
- JavaScript and the web units - graded as you complete them.
- My web development assignments - some peer reviewed.
- Introduction, journal, and work logs - as in all my courses.
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.
Peer review applies to my assignments, never to Khan Academy work. There's nothing useful to say about someone else's unit completion. Where an assignment does carry peer review, the principles on the Grading page apply - a score of 1 means that piece needs work, and Canvas states the split for that assignment.
The Web Work
Pages you build for me follow the Web Standards like any other course of mine - run the checker before you submit. Course Standards covers how to work here generally, and the FAQ explains why the journal and work logs exist - this course's own FAQ covers the Khan Academy questions that come up every term. Assignments lays out the sequence, and the Schedule numbers the weeks.