a few questions... (1 Viewer)

[freaking_out]

my sdd teacher is very crap and she also does not know how to teach, in fact she was once asked what USB stands for and she didn't know. also for every question you ask her she refers to the text book and reads it out to you (mind you she knows how to use the index of the text book very well ) infact people in my class refer to her as a casual teacher who supervises the class rather than a sdd teacher (what a waste of tax payers money) ........so you know the situation i am in ..... anyway i have a few questions :

1) what option should i choose since i am teaching the course to myself? which one is the easiest? which one re inforces the core very well?? etc.

2) should i make notes on each syllabus point as you do with science subjects? also i noticed that there are two columns in da syllabus, how relavant are each column in the hsc exam?

3) Is there anything else you need to learn for the hsc apart from the stuff in the t.book such as pracs?

4) any other comments.

btw, did i mention ... our major project is gonna be a webPAGE not a website.

 

[del]

eek...

1) If you don't like playing with numbers or the alike, choose the Evolution Of Programming Languages option. I guess if you're teaching it to yourself that may seem easier. Hmm thats the one we did. It was good.

2) Yes make notes for each syllabus point.

3) Make sure you know your standard algorithms, and that you know how to read/write an algorithm. There will always be an algorithm question.

4) Do past papers...

your major project is a webpage?!?! Does it have to have actual code with control structured in in such as JavaScript?

 

[freaking_out]

Javascript?????? what javascript? she doesn't even know what javascript is let alone tell us to use it........ she thinks that webpages (using normal html) is programming. a guy in prelim. used a hover button ,that you find readily in frontpage and all, in his webpage and you know what.... she was "impressed". This is her first year with sdd but her ipt students from last year warned me "to drop sdd at all costs if you have her."

oh yeah, also what programming language do i have to know if there is any..... me myself i know flash actionscripting and c++ but its no use for her classes.

 

[del]

the syllabus doesn't state that you need to know any particular programming language. Basically make sure you can write/read algorithms. That's important...

if u choose to do the Evolution Of Programming Languages topic, have a squiz at languages from each of the paradigms... it really helps. Our teacher made us program little things in it, so that we properly understood each paradigm... um we did as follows

logic paradigm: prolog
functional: dr scheme (thats like a programming teaching tool, similar to LISP)
object oriented: java....

but if u know actionscript, c++ already you should be okay, 'cos I'm guessing you'd already know the basics of programming

 

[freaking_out]

yeah... i know the basics of programming. hey also, do you have to submit your major works to the board or somethin' like that?

 

[del]

nope.... its just school based

 

[freaking_out]

btw.. what do the two columns in the syllabus mean and how relevant are they to the hsc??

 

[:: ck ::]

hey just wonderin what school you go to ?!

how can you have a teacher who does not know the difference between javascript being programming and html as being merely a markup language

complain - i'd do it like hell if i was you

turning to grade 11 next year :: might have the same situation as you theres this dumbass teacher who thinks teaching sdd requires "10 minutes free time each lesson so he can go on his computer to search the web and email ppl while we go play games..."

if he does end up teaching the class im in id complain first thing

its all fun and games till u get faced with the monster hsc ~

 

[freaking_out]

complain - i'd do it like hell if i was you

sadly i did, but stupid principal kept on saying that she is qualified and he points to her success last year as they got high marks in her class. but i my self asked these people who got high marks and they said that this teacher was bullshit and they had to go tutoring and study for themselves to get their marks...... i mean for the principal all he cares is the piece of paper.

U know what in another case someone asked her what an identifier was and there was a long pause... then a kid screamed out something stupid and she goes "yeah thats it (what the kid yelled out)." and another thing for prelims, we didn't get a textbook until term 2... so we never did the course coz she said "we were waiting for the t.book" and when we got them, the things i mentioned happened.

 

[del]

hmm yeh theory

know the stages of the software development cycle and what happens where... especially in terms of documentation, why you use it, who uses it etc etc....

also software development approaches... make sure you can distinguish between both, and also justify why a particular approach should be used for a given situation

 

[:: ck ::]

for the recent figures

how many people got band 6 for sdd

 

[del]

Originally posted by :: ryan.cck ::
for the recent figures

how many people got band 6 for sdd

69 people outta 3687 got a band 6 for SDD. Me got band 6 (94), placed me 7th overall

 

[freaking_out]

why is it like only 69 people got band 6? wtf?????? hey, actually now i think about it, i rather have a website as a major and then just do enough work for the hsc . however in year 10 and 11 i did do a lot of the unsw programming comp. questions so maybe i might do some more at home... otherwise a websites fine with me.

btw post up all ya assessments to bos or somefin'

 

[marsesbars]

Actually, i did my major work as a webpage last year! We had to design a reservation system for a caravan park, and I decided to make it so you could access it with a browser It worked out pretty well in the end.

You only ever saw the webpages when you used my finished project - you can make webpages in frontpage if you want - and the code behind it was done with PHP. (see www.php.net for more info) It's a language like VB, Pascal, Python or C, and if you've used any of the those, PHP will be a breeze to learn... and there's an awesome online manual to help you learn! I've never used online help except for the PHP manual. Another plus is PHP built with support for databases, so for my project I coded the algorithms in PHP, showed the output in webpages and stored all the caravan reservation info in the database.

Bad stuff about PHP?
* You've got to run your program with a webserver program (I used Apache.) Which means when you hand in your project, your teacher's got to install Apache and PHP and your code, which means you've got to write more documentation. Ugh.
* PHP code gets real messy if you've got a complicated project. I hear that Python code is much nicer.
* You gotta mix PHP with HTML which is complicated... making the code messier.

So, would I recommend PHP for your major project? If you're feeling adventurous then go for it! But there are easier languages that take less effort to learn and are easier to make your project with... Microsoft Access, or VB, or whatever!

EDIT: Just remembered: the boredofstudies messageboard you're reading now was made with PHP and mySQL. Another example of how good PHP is!!

 

[:: ck ::]

ok thanks

btw congratulations =)

 

[del]

i made my major project for my school... hmm i think i have to modify it this year for them.... eek.. i hope i have my documentation somewhere

cool reservation system.. that must've been heaps fun. I made something similar for IPT... library system which allowed signing up of new members, searching, checking out (borrowing) of books... but did it using ASP... 'cos I could use vbscript ..... but yeh the whole u need a webserver to run it poses a bit of a problem if ppl wanna check it out

 

[:: ck ::]

1.can you explain what is the major project ?

2.does it relate to the exam paper
(like is there a question which asks you to describe parts of your project or something like that)


php is really useful... same as ASP
however the fact you have to install it onto the schools computer (unless your school is cool and you can run it on their webserver if they run IIS or apache or something similar)

which is crap...

thats my 2 c for the day

 

[marsesbars]

Bon, I totally agree that the more practice you get at writing your own sorting/searching algorithms, the better. About PHP... you can write our own sorting code in PHP, it's just that PHP has functions (like 'asort' and 'rsort') that do it for you if you choose to use them. Most people do because it's easier

But yeah I definitely say that PHP is not the best choice for the major project - you need to install a webserver to run your code, you can't compile your code, the syntax gets annoying, you need to learn HTML to output stuff...

ryan.cck, the major project is just a big assignment where you choose a programming task, go through the Software Development Lifecycle with it (define, understand, plan, implement, test, maintain) to implement it, and document everything along the way! It's not just programming... it varies from school to school, but my teacher made the finished product and code worth 10% of the marks and the 90% was documentation. So documentation is very important - why design software when you can document it

in response to "2. does it relate to the exam paper?". Yes! Because the syllabus says its meant to "reinforce what's learnt in the course" or something like that (check it out). In the specimen HSC paper they asked you to draw a Gantt chart of the progress of your major project - so they can ask questions about the Software Development Lifecycle and get you to include evidence from your major project. Anyhow, if they don't ask, doing the algorithms for your project gives you good practice - try to choose projects where you gotta sort arrays, search arrays... projects that give you practice for the types of algorithms they'll make you do in the exam, as Bon recommends.

 

[marsesbars]

About whether you should make notes on each dot-point... IMO you don't need to. But do what works for you!

What worked for me was: for dot points they could make nasty written response questions about (social and ethical issues, the type of implementation that's best), I'd remember the main points and then practice past papers.
So to study the "rights and responsibilities of software developers" I'd remember the main points in the syllabus... authorship, reliability, quality of software... learn what these are, then get a past HSC question on this dot point, and practice answering it.
To use an analogy, the points you use to answer the questions would be like palm cards you'd use in a debate. My friend put it this way, to answer written response questions you need "2% terminology, 98% BS" Anyway, that practice would set you up for the HSC exam quite nicely.

 

[freaking_out]

My friend put it this way, to answer written response questions you need "2% terminology, 98% BS"

actually thats the more likely case for english responses rather than sdd.