My programming skills have greatly improved in the following ways:
My programming skills have greatly improved since taking this class. At the beginning of the semester, I questioned whether I was capable enough to take this class and become an MIS major in general. However, my improvement in programming has made me more confident in my skills and knowledge. Although I still have times where I struggle in this class, I am definitely able to grasp the concepts quicker than before.
I need to work on the following to improve my programming skills:
I feel like there are concepts that I still don’t fully understand. In order to fix this, I need to go back and review to make sure that I am more solidified with them. As the semester has progressed, I have learned that in this class especially, if you don’t understand one thing, it is a chain reaction of not being able to understand the next thing.
I have learned a lot from doing WODs and I can do them without copying the screencast:
Yes, I definitely learned a lot from doing the WODs. I was able to do them at least once without the screencast and only used it if I was really struggling and had no idea how to solve the problem.
The labs have helped me learn and I am able to complete them with confidence:
Yes, the labs have definitely helped me to learn. However, I wouldn’t say I was able to complete them in confidence. Since the labs are new material, I need to go over each exercise thoroughly. Since we had to finish the lab on our own a lot of times, I’m not sure I was able to properly grasp some of the concepts as much as I would’ve liked.
I learned a lot from my experience doing Assignment 1 and feel ready to work on Assignment 2:
Assignment 1 was a bit difficult for me. Although I understand the individual concepts from the labs that we go over in class, I had a hard time figuring out how everything should connect together. Therefore, it was a big challenge for me to try to think things through and I referred to examples for help. Also, after doing this assignment, I realized that there may be some things that I have to go back and review as I may not understand some things as well as I thought I did. I definitely didn’t anticipate how difficult assignment 1 would be which makes me a bit nervous for assignment 2.
I think the class can be improved to help my learning in the following ways:
I feel like we move very fast in class. We only spend about 2 or maybe even 1 day covering a new topic and we move onto the next topic pretty quickly before being able to truly grasp what we just learned. Therefore, I wish that there were lab screencasts for when we didn’t finish the labs in class. When trying to finish the labs on my own, I often got very confused and wasn’t sure if my code was correct and if the results I was getting was correct.
What helps me the most in class are (WODs, Labs, class website, screencasts, readings, quizzes, one on one help, working with classmates, etc.):
The WODs, labs, and screencasts were the most helpful for me. The WODs helped me to apply my skills from the labs through a timed challenge. The labs are very helpful, especially when Professor Port explains and goes through each exercise thoroughly. The screencasts are very helpful because I am the type of person that needs to see examples and explanations in order to fully understand something rather than just reading about it. Therefore, I always make it a point to watch the screencasts.