Syllabus
Frequently Needed Information
Meeting Times
Session | Instructor(s) | Time | Location |
Lecture 1 | Kelly Rivers (krivers) | MWF 4-4:50pm EDT | Zoom |
Lecture 2 | David Touretzky (dst) | MWF 5:20-6:10pm EDT | Zoom |
|
Recitation A/I-Remote | Abhi (adevarap) and Jonan (jseeley) | R 9:20-10:10am EDT | Zoom |
Recitation B/J-Remote | Laura (lkoye) and Mahima (mshanwar) | R 10:40-11:30am EDT | Zoom |
Recitation C/K-Remote | Diaj (dtoussai) and Neha (npc) | R 12:00-12:50pm EDT | Zoom |
Recitation D/L-Remote | Anagha (asrikuma) and Claudia (cosorio) | R 1:20-2:10pm EDT | Zoom |
Recitation E/M-Remote | Enock (emaburi) and Nazanin (nazimi) | R 2:40-3:30pm EDT | Zoom |
Recitation F/N-Remote | Ashley (awzhang) and Tara (tarap) | R 4:00-4:50pm EDT | Zoom |
Recitation G/O-Remote | Evans (evansc) and Neeraj (neerajsa) | R 5:20-6:10pm EDT | Zoom |
Recitation H/P-Remote | Hita (rkambham) and Tyler (tjlowe) | R 6:40-7:30pm EDT | Zoom |
International Recitation X | Amanda (lianglij) and Rae (yirandua) | R 10-10:50pm EDT | Zoom |
International Recitation Y | Frank (frankh) | R 8:10-9pm EDT | Zoom |
|
Recitation A/I-Cluster | Iris (ilu1) | R 9:20-10:10am EDT | GHC 4307 |
Recitation B/J-Cluster | Rachel (rachelt1) | R 10:40-11:30am EDT | GHC 6115 |
Recitation C/K-Cluster-1 | Elyana (erhurst) | R 12:00-12:50pm EDT | GHC 6115 |
Recitation C/K-Cluster-2 | Kailas (kshekar) | R 12:00-12:50pm EDT | GHC 4215 |
Recitation D/L-Cluster-1 | Meghan (mamcgraw) | R 1:20-2:10pm EDT | GHC 4215 |
Recitation D/L-Cluster-2 | Amit (amitnag) | R 1:20-2:10pm EDT | CYH B6 |
Recitation E/M-Cluster | Meghan (mamcgraw) | R 2:40-3:30pm EDT | GHC 4401 |
Recitation F/N-Cluster | Flako (daniells) and Lauren (leheller) | R 4:00-4:50pm EDT | GHC 4401 |
Recitation G/O-Cluster-1 | Sarah (sstaplet) | R 5:20-6:10pm EDT | GHC 6115 |
Recitation G/O-Cluster-2 | Kailas (kshekar) | R 5:20-6:10pm EDT | GHC 4401 |
Recitation H/P-Cluster | Lauren (leheller) | R 6:40-7:30pm EDT | GHC 4401 |
Office Hours
All students are encouraged to use office hours to learn and receive help on homework assignments! Note that most help sessions take place online, usually via Zoom.
| Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday |
TA Hours | 5-8pm | 9-10am, 5-8pm, 10-11pm | 9-10am, 5-8pm, 10-11pm | 5-8pm, 10-11pm | 5-8pm | 12-5pm, 10-11pm | 2-7pm, 10-11pm |
Collaboration Hours | | | | | | | |
Instructor Hours | 10-11am (krivers) | 2-3:30pm (dst) | 1-2pm (krivers) | 3:30-5pm (dst) | 2-3pm (krivers) | | |
Schedule
The course schedule is available
here.
Zoom links for all group course activities are available
here. You must be logged into your CMU Google account to access this page.
Feedback
Give post-lecture and general course feedback here:
https://bit.ly/110-feedback
Give post-recitation feedback here:
https://forms.gle/NmBJdt4zwTxgsjuw8
Grading
Final Grades are computed as follows:
Midsemester and Final grades will be assigned using a standard scale:
- A: [90 - 100]
- B: [80 - 90)
- C: [70 - 80)
- D: [60 - 70)
- R: [00 - 60)
Who To Contact
Contact your
Recitation TA(s) for the following: small group session scheduling, additional help
Contact the
Head TAs for the following: grading concerns, TA feedback, submission issues
Contact the
Professors for the following: extension requests, lecture/homework issues, academic integrity concerns, general course concerns
Course Components
Learning Objectives
By the end of this course, students should be able to:
- Read and write programs using basic Python syntax
- Recognize how computers represent concepts with abstraction
- Identify which data structures can be used to represent different kinds of data
- Recognize that efficiency can affect the practical use of a program
- Identify different techniques for running programs at scale
- Use computer science and computational thinking as tools in other domains
- Identify how computer science affects the world in the past, present, and future
Assessments
Learning is accomplished through four types of assessments: quizzes, check-ins, homeworks, and tests.
Quizzes: short (1-3 problem)
Gradescope quizzes released with each lecture. Assesses whether the student has introductory knowledge of the lecture's content (have you started learning the material, by attending class or reviewing on your own). Can be retaken as many times as necessary until the desired score is reached.
- Deadline: 1 hour before the next lecture.
- Revision Deadline: noon EDT on the day before the closest assignment's corresponding test.
Check-ins: short assignments that cover the material learned in the previous week. Usually composed of a written part and a programming part. These assignments can be completed collaboratively, but you must write up the solutions yourself; see more information in the
Collaboration section. Written assignments can be completed by printing the assignment, writing answers by hand, and scanning the result; alternatively, you can type answers in the fillable PDF electronically by using Preview (Macs) or
Adobe Reader (Windows/Macs). Programming assignments can be completed by editing the starter file in an IDE. Both parts should be submitted to Gradescope for grading and feedback.
- Deadline: noon EDT on the stated date (usually Mondays).
- Revision Deadline: noon EDT on the day before the assignment's corresponding test.
Homeworks: like check-ins in format, but longer and covering material both from the previous week
and from the preceeding check-in's week (if there is a preceeding check-in).
- Deadline: noon EDT on the stated date (usually Mondays).
- Revision Deadline: noon EDT on the day before the assignment's corresponding test.
Tests: long (8-12 problem)
Canvas quizzes released on specified days, usually a week after a homework deadline. Covers material from the homework and check-in that preceeded it.
Must be taken individually, not collaboratively. Must be taken using Canvas's LockDown Browser functionality. Students may use notes (printed or accessed via slides on the course website) during tests. Students will also be able to access the course Piazza, where they can ask
private clarification questions related to the test.
- Deadline: must be taken between 12am EDT - 11:59pm EDT on the specified day.
- If you are unable to complete the test on a specified day, contact the instructors to arrange accommodations.
There will also be a
final exam, which will take place during the university's final exam period. This will cover material from the entire semester.
Resources
Course Website: contains the syllabus, schedule, assignments, and links to all materials. Everything you need for the course can be accessed here.
Class Sessions: this is where you learn the course material. Attendance is not mandatory, but it is strongly encouraged.
- Lecture: in lecture the instructors teach the primary content, and go over some examples relevant to the homework assignments. Lectures take place on Zoom, and lecture recordings are posted on Canvas for students who are unable to attend live.
- Recitation: in recitation the TAs lead students through problems connected to the material taught in lecture in the previous week. Recitations are highly useful as homework preparation. Recitations take place either in person or via Zoom. Recitations are not recorded, to encourage active participation.
- Small Group Sessions: in small group sessions, TAs work with 2-5 students from their recitation to review content or collaboratively work on problems related to the course content. This is an excellent resource for students who want more guided study time and practice. Small group sessions take place either in person or via Zoom, and are not recorded.
Gradescope: quizzes are taken here, and assignments are submitted here. Programming assignments are usually autograded; refresh the submission page after submitting to see your score (you may resubmit as many times as you want). Feedback is also visible for both written and programming assignments once manual grading has been done.
Piazza: announcements will be made via Piazza, and it will be used for discussion and questions as well. Visit it frequently or set your preferences to send you an email whenever an announcement is made. This is also a good place to ask short questions (TAs monitor it daily) and to review general questions asked by other students. Please follow these etiquette guidelines when posting on Piazza:
- Be specific! Clearly reference which content area or homework problem you have a question about.
- Target your post appropriately! When you ask a general content/homework question that may be useful to others, make the question public (you will be anonymous to other students). When you ask a specific question about your answer to a homework problem that includes part of your solution, make the post private (it will still be visible to the TAs and instructors).
- If you still have related questions after someone answers your main question, create a followup discussion. Mark the discussion thread as resolved as soon as your question has been answered.
- If you include any amount of code in a Piazza post, put it in a code block (use the {;} button). Do not post screenshots of code, as this make debugging more difficult.
- When you ask for debugging help, describe any debugging you've already done and what you think the problem might be.
OH Queue: the OH Queue is used to facilitate office hours, where you can ask questions and receive help. You can post a question or request for help on the queue once it is opened, and a TA will contact you when it is your turn. Note that TAs may be limited in the amount of time they can spend with you if the queue is long. There are three different forms of office hours:
- TA Hours are held every day. These are a good place to get help with the course material or homework assignments. When you have a question, create a new Zoom meeting, then sign up on the OH Queue and put a link to your Zoom meeting in the comments box. A TA will come find you to help.
- Collaboration Hours take place on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays. These are public Zoom meetings monitored by TAs where students can interact and collaborate with other students while working on homework assignments. Note that TAs in this context might not have time to answer individual questions; those should be brought to TA Hours instead. Collaboration Hours do not use the OH Queue.
- Instructor Hours are held on weekdays. These are a good place to ask questions directly of the instructor, to get general homework and course material help, or just to talk with the instructors about topics of interest. Students are welcome at all Instructor Hours, regardless of which lecture you are registered for. Follow the instructions for TA Hours to participate in Instructor Hours. Meetings with the instructors are also available by appointment.
Canvas: tests and the final exam will take place on Canvas. You will need to take these assessments using LockDown Browser, which you can download
here. Grades will also be posted here, and lecture recordings are posted on Pages.
Course Materials
Note that this course does not have a required textbook; all course materials will be posted online.
Required Software
Every required software package we use is available for free on the web, and also installed on all cluster computers in GHC. This includes:
- Python version 3.x (3.6 or later), which can be freely downloaded and installed from python.org.
- Pyzo, a free IDE (Interactive Development Environment) that is designed for introductory courses. To set up Pyzo on a personal computer, follow these instructions:
- Download and install Pyzo here.
- Launch Pyzo.
- Setup your shell configuration to run Python 3
- On the top menu, click Shell->Edit Shell Configurations
- Click the dropdown labeled exe, and choose python.exe [v3.x]
- Under gui, select None - no GUI support (otherwise you may have problems when we do graphics)
- Press Done
- Restart Pyzo and you're ready to go!
- For a simple Python3 test, type this line of code in the shell/interpreter (with ">>>"):
print(5/3)
then press Enter. You should not get 1 (which you would get if you are using Python2) but instead should get 1.666666667.
You may use another IDE of your choice, but we will not support it if you have any IDE questions or if it breaks.
Optional Resources
None of these resources are required; however, they may be useful if you want additional practice.
- Past 15-110 Courses
- Official Documentation
- Useful Tools
- Python Shells (in the browser)
- Python Exercises (for a bit more practice)
- Online Learning Resources
- Online Advanced Resourecs
Course Policies
In-person and Remote Interaction
Learning in a pandemic requires different interactions from what we're all used to. To help make sure that everyone feels safe and welcomed in the classroom environment, we require that all people involved in 15-110 (students, TAs, and instructors) follow these guidelines.
In-person Interaction
- Wear a mask: when attending recitations or small group sessions in person, wear a mask or face shield that properly covers your mouth and nose. My mask protects you; your mask protects me.
- Physical distancing: when possible, attempt to keep 6 feet between yourself and all other people in the classroom/learning area.
- Health monitoring: follow CMU's guidelines and monitor your health every day. If you exhibit any COVID-19 symptoms, or if you are told by the university that you need to self-isolate, stay home. You are always welcome to attend class via Zoom. You can do this by contacting your recitation TA before class; they will direct you on whether to attend your normal recitation via Zoom, or whether you should attend a different remote recitation at the same time.
Zoom Interaction
- Zoom Names and Accounts: make sure Zoom lists the name you'd prefer others use for you, not your andrewID or some other identifier. You may also include your pronouns in parentheses after your name. Finally, make sure that you attend class sessions using your CMU Zoom account; non-CMU accounts will not be able to access the sessions.
- Yes to Video, No to Audio: when attending lecture or recitation, you should generally keep your video on and your audio off (unless you are asking/answering a question). Having video on creates more of a sense of community in the class and helps the instructor/TA judge whether students are confused or understand the material. Having audio off keeps the class from being interrupted by random sounds in the background. Note: it's okay to keep your video off if your camera doesn't work, you are in a public location, or you simply aren't comfortable sharing video. However, we prefer that videos be turned on by default.
- Questions via Chat and Raised Hands: if you have a question or want to answer an instructor/TA's question, you can either type your comment in the chat, or request permission to turn on your audio by using the raise-hand emote. For the chat, you may use either the public chat or send a message directly to the instructor/TA (though we recommend the public chat when possible). For verbal comments, if the instructor/TA calls on you, you can then turn on your audio for the duration of the question. Note: some recitations may relax the rules on keeping audio off if they are small in size.
- Only One Recording: the instructors will record their lectures and post them on Canvas. Please do not make any secondary recordings of lecture, and do not record recitations or other class sessions.
Late Policy
Quizzes, check-ins, and homeworks all have two deadlines: the normal deadline and the revision deadline. The normal deadline is when you should complete the activity for maximal pedagogical benefit, and a maximal score. The course staff will generally grade assignments and release feedback once the normal deadline has passed. If you made mistakes on the assignment, you may read the feedback, fix the mistakes, and resubmit up until the revision deadline.
Assignments submitted after the regular deadline are capped at a score of 90 points; in other words, if you get a 90 or above on an assignment, there is no reason to resubmit (though we still encourage you to read your feedback and make corrections to your local assignment).
If you fail to complete the assignment by the regular deadline, you may also submit for the first time at any point up until the revision deadline, again with the score capped at 90 points. The course staff will attempt to grade your submission as quickly as possible so that you have the opportunity to revise and resubmit if needed. All assignments will be graded by noon EDT on the day after the revision deadline at the very latest.
Extensions
If you are unable to take a test on the specified day or cannot complete an assignment by the revision deadline for one of the following reasons, please contact the instructors
before the deadline so that we can arrange an extension.
- COVID Emergencies: if you are experiencing an emergency due to COVID-19 that keeps you from participating in class (such as you or a family member becoming ill, or a government-imposed quarantine interrupting internet access), please contact the course instructors and your advisor ASAP! We are very willing to work with you to develop a modified course schedule.
- Non-COVID Medical Emergencies: if you are sick to the point that you cannot take a test or do work, go to Student Health Services or your local doctor! Students who have medical emergencies may obtain extensions from the instructors if you let us know as soon as possible.
- Family/Personal Emergencies: if you are having a family or personal emergency (such as a death in the family or a mental health crisis), reach out to your academic advisor or housefellow immediately! These people will help support you in your time of need, and will also reach out to all of your instructors (including the 15-110 instructors) to request extensions for you.
Additionally: if a religious day you observe conflicts with a test date, or you have previously-scheduled travel that conflicts with a test date, let the course instructors know
before the add deadline. We may be able to move test dates in some cases.
Regrade Requests
We occasionally make mistakes while grading (we're only human!). If you find a mistake which you would like us to correct, please submit a regrade request on Gradescope
within one week of the time when the contested grade was released. Note- regrade requests will result in the entire problem being regraded, not just the incorrectly graded part.
Formatting Errors
Make sure that your submitted assignments do not have any formatting errors! Written assignments must be submitted in PDF format (unless otherwise specified), and code assignments must not have any syntax errors.
We will assign a penalty for every line of code we must edit to make your code run. Please submit your code at least one time before the deadline and check the autograder's feedback to ensure that everything works.
Minimum Grades
Mathematical analysis shows that giving 0s as grades has an extremely detrimental effect on a student's ability to catch up on work and pass a course. This is partially because of the way letter grades are distributed- there are only 10 points allocated for each of A, B, C, and D, then 60 points are allocated for an R, a failing grade. This has a severe impact on students who, for whatever reason, have an outlier score among their grades. For example, a student who receives a 95 on five homework assignments and a 0 on one homework assignment would receive an average of a 79, or a C, despite demonstrating A-level knowledge on most of the assignments.
To combat this problem, we are setting the minimum grade that a student can receive on any assessment in the class to a 50, not a 0. We will still grade assignments and tests on a 0-100 scale, and you will still see your grade on this scale in Gradescope, but if you receive a score < 50 on an assessment, that score will be changed to 50 in the Canvas gradebook.
Collaboration and Academic Integrity
Collaboration
Students are encouraged to collaborate when learning the material and working on assignments. Here are a list of examples on how to collaborate well within this class.
- Work on practice problems together with any level of collaboration.
- Discuss which general concepts might be useful in solving a problem (loops, data representation, etc.)
- Sketch out solutions on a whiteboard together.
- You should sketch out the solution together, discuss it, then erase the solution, do something else for a while, then write up the solutions individually. Don't just copy the solution directly from the whiteboard- then you might not fully understand it!
- For programming problems, review test cases together and discuss why the inputs result in specific outputs.
- For programming problems, help each other debug specific parts of assignment code.
- NOTE: do not 'debug' by telling a friend to try your approach instead! Help them figure out what is actually going wrong. To be safe, do not refer to your own code when helping a friend debug.
Academic Integrity in Assignments
We encourage students to collaborate on assignments, as collaboration leads to good learning. However, there are certain restrictions on how much collaboration is allowed, to ensure that all students understand the material they submit on homework assignments. In general,
all collaborators must contribute intellectually and understand the material they produce, and
each student must write up their own assignment submission individually. Our academic integrity policy is written to ensure that this happens.
The following actions are considered academic integrity offenses on the homework assignment:
- Copying or stealing any amount of written text or code from someone currently in the class or someone who has taken the class before.
- Copying is never okay, whether the solution is provided electronically, visually, audibly, or on paper.
- Providing text or code you have written for an assignment to anyone else in the class.
- Again: never share your solution with others in the class, including electronic sharing, showing someone the solution on your computer, verbally speaking the solution, or writing down the solution on paper.
- This includes providing your old solutions to future students who will take the class after you've completed it.
- Finding answers online and using them in the assignment
- Exception: you may use code from the course website or the Official Python Documentation. Please include a citation with a link when you do this.
- If you are reviewing a general topic online outside of the course website and official documentation and find a small piece of code that might be useful, check with the instructors on Piazza on whether it's okay to use it before integrating it into your solution. Also include a citation here!
- Posting solutions from the course assignments online in public view
- Getting someone else to write the assignment for you
- Asking questions about the assignments on any online services outside of the course office hours and course Piazza
- StackOverflow will be a great resource once you've learned the basics of coding, but it will not be helpful now. Trust us on this one.
- Attempting to 'hack' or decompile Gradescope or the autograder to produce solutions
Academic Integrity in Tests
Tests must be taken individually. It will be considered an academic integrity offense if a student:
- Communicates with another person not on the course staff in any way while taking the test
- Receives information about the test from another student who took the test earlier, or shares information about the test with a student who takes the test after them
- Makes any portion of the test available to other students or publically online
Penalties
Academic Integrity Violations result in a penalty on the first offense, and failing the course on the second offense. Penalties depend on the severity of the violation and can include:
- Redoing the problem/assignment from scratch
- Receiving a 0 on the problem/assignment
- Receiving a full letter grade deduction in the course
- Automatically failing the course
Penalties are usually accompanied by a letter to the Dean of Student Affairs, to be officially filed as an academic integrity offense. A first offense usually leads to a discussion with Student Affairs about academic integrity at the university. Two or more offenses lead to university-level penalties, such as being suspended or expelled.
Plagiarism Detection
Programs are naturally structured, which makes them much easier to compare than hand-written work, and easier to compare than typed essays. We run an automated plagiarism detection system on all assignments to detect copied code.
We will notice if you copy code. Don't do it.
Grace Period
Your first year of college is a time when you do a lot of learning. Sometimes, you might make bad decisions or mistakes. The most important thing for you to do is to learn from your mistakes, to constantly grow and become a better person.
Sometimes, students panic and copy code right before the deadline, then regret what they did afterwards. Therefore,
you may rescind any homework submission up to 24 hours after the submission was made with no questions asked. Simply email the course instructors and ask us to delete the submission in question, and we will do so. Deleted submissions will not be considered during plagiarism detection, though of course they will also not be graded.
General Policies
Health and Wellness
Your first priority should always be to take care of yourself, and this is doubly important during tumultuous pandemic times. Take care of yourself this semester by eating well, getting enough sleep, exercising, socializing, and taking some time to relax. This will help you achieve your goals and cope with stress.
All of us benefit from support during times of struggle. If you or anyone you know experiences any academic stress, difficult life events, or feelings of anxiety or depression, we strongly encourage you to seek support. Contact the Counseling and Psychological Services (CaPS) office at 412-268-2922 and visit their website at
http://www.cmu.edu/counseling for more information.
If you or someone you know is in danger of self-harm, please call someone immediately, day or night:
CaPS: 412-268-2922
Re:solve Crisis Network: 888-796-8226
CMU Police: On-Campus 412-268-2323, Off-Campus 911
Diversity and Inclusion
We warmly welcome students with a wide range of backgrounds and identities in this course. We strive to make every student in this class feel safe and welcome, both because we respect you as human beings with a diverse set of experiences and because we want to make learning computer science as accessible as possible. We acknowledge that computer science as a field currently suffers from a lack of racial and gender diversity, and we want to make the field more broadly accessible for all people. If you are interested in joining efforts to broaden diversity in computer science, consider joining
SCS4All or talking to the course staff about other ways to get involved.
If something happens that makes you feel unsafe, unwelcome, or discriminated against,
please let us know. You are always encouraged to reach out to the course instructors; we will listen and support you. You can email the professors directly, or contact us anonymously via the
general course feedback form. You are also encouraged to reach out to the Center for Student Diversity and Inclusion
here if you wish to report concerns anonymously; they will then be able to take appropriate actions to support you.
Acommodations
We gladly accommodate students with accommodations that have been approved by the Office of Disability Resources (ODR), as explained
here). If you are eligible for accommodations, please submit the appropriate form to the instructors in the
first two weeks of the semester. If you need to acquire the form, contact ODR using
these instructions. Note that students who receive extended time on tests will receive that extra time within Canvas automatically. If you are registered to receive extra time in 15-110 and your test does
not have extra time applied, please contact the course instructors immediately so we can fix it.
Waitlist
If you are on the waitlist,
don't panic! Most waitlisted students get into the course eventually. Attend lecture and recitation, submit the assignments, and stay involved. If you are still not enrolled at the beginning of the third week, contact the course instructors and we will try to help you find a section with open seats.
Auditing
We have found that students who audit 15-110 do not tend to succeed, as they generally cannot dedicate the needed time to the course. Therefore, auditing will only be allowed in exceptional circumstances, and must be approved by the course instructors first.
If you wish to take 15-110 but don't want or need a full letter grade for it, you may take the course as Pass/Fail instead. This is a great option for graduate students who want to learn how to program but don't want to risk their GPAs! (Note: you may not take the course Pass/Fail if you plan to use 15-110 as a prereq).
Tips for Success
Most students who take 15-110 have no prior programming experience. If you fall into this group, taking your first computer science class will provide great opportunities, but it also may pose great challenges. Here are some tips for how to succeed in this course as you learn a new and exciting set of skills and concepts.
- Participate. You cannot learn how to program passively, by observing someone else; you have to practice. While attending lecture, follow along in your own IDE and try modifying the code the instructor writes to see what happens. In recitation, actively attempt each problem to the best of your ability before the TA goes over the solution. In general, try things out and see what happens!
- Start Early. Don't wait until the day before the deadline to start an assignment! After each lecture, identify problems on the assignment that you can now attempt, and try to solve them. Doing the assignments a bit at a time is much easier than trying to do them all at once.
- Embrace Mistakes. "Bugs" (mistakes) are a common part of the programming process. Even expert programmers commonly produce bugs in their code that they need to fix (you'll see this happen to the instructors a lot!). Run your code to check your work often, and treat every bug as an opportunity to learn, not as a dead end.
- Get Help When You Need It. It's okay (and encouraged!!) to reach out for help when you're struggling with a concept or an assignment. Come to office hours and the course staff will be more than happy to help you learn. Find a collaborator and talk through the problems with them. In general, don't feel like you need to do everything on your own - embrace your learning community!
- Debug Smarter, Not Harder. It is very easy to get stuck when debugging an error in a program and spend hours on a single mistake with no progress. If you find yourself spending more than 15 minutes debugging the same error, you need to change your approach. First, try to get someone else to help you (a TA or a collaborator in the class); often a new set of eyes will notice things that you can't see yourself, and explaining your code to someone else may help you notice something new. Second, if no one else is available, take a break and do something else. When you come back to the problem later, you'll be able to see your code in a new light, and it might prove much easier to fix.
- Read Your Feedback. Check-ins and Homeworks are partially summative assignments (they show what you know), but they're also partially formative (they're a chance to learn). When an assignment has been graded, go back and check the feedback written by TAs on the problems you got wrong. This is your chance to relearn the material before the test occurs.
- Study By Practicing. In this class, you'll mainly learn skills - things you do, rather than pieces of knowledge you know. To study a skill, you need to practice it. When preparing for an exam, don't just review old slides and homeworks - actually re-solve old problems, or attempt the practice problems provided with the test.
Worried about taking a course online from home? Here are some
tips for success.