Computer Science Teacher – Thoughts and Information from Alfred Thompson : Advanced Placement Computer Science – Time for a Big Change?

I thought for a long time, that we are covering way to much material in both subject areas.

However, I’m not sure what material should be cut from the A exam.  Having experienced and taught Java for a few years, the coolest part of Java is inheritance.  It definately needs to be included.  Perhaps moving arrays and array lists to the AB exam might be a good choice.  I know that some colleges don’t do them until the second semester of CS.

The AB exam is also way too big.  It was fine when it stopped at queues and stacks.  Most data structure classes stop there, or only briefly touch on Maps and Sets.

I honestly do not believe that the AP CS program would survive another language change.  However, I wish we’d never left Pascal.  It was designed as a teaching language and there is nothing wrong with that.  I would never, ever want to see us go back to C++.  Even going there was a big mistake.  It drove a lot of high school teachers out of teaching computer science.  It also drove a lot of schools out of it, because it was just too expensive.

Changing to Java drove out teachers also, but most of those are ones who had trouble with coping with the C++ change, and thought it would be as bad.  I know a few who left during that area and I think they should have hung out longer.

I do believe Java is a good choice.  I just don’t think we should be jumping to each major release.  Remember, it takes a long time for textbooks to be revised and a longer time between adoptions.  Texas adopts new textbooks every 7 years.  We should also give the teaching tools time to adapt.

The main reason I like Java is there are a lot of good free materials out there.  However, there are not enough yet.  Many of them are written by college professors for the college market and these are high school students. 

I also like the case studies.  I’ve tried using them as I go, but it never seems to work out.  This year is working out well though.  I am also really looking forward to GridWorld though I think it is not much different than the MBS.  However, the biggest reason I like the case study is that the students have access to a large body of code to model on during the test. 

I would like to see the local universities do more to help us.  They have talked about it in the past, but they never seem to follow through.  I’d also like to see more online learning opportunities, and not just for the AP program.  There are a lot of high schools who have choosen Visual Basic and I would like to see Microsoft giving us more support.  The Mainfunction was a great website, but we need more!

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