Abstract
This paper describes a project we have recently started for automating introductory computer science courses. Why should these courses be automated? At the University of Illinois there are currently about 2000 students per semester taking various introductory programming courses: engineers, social scientists, teachers, physical scientists, computer science majors, etc., each group having its own particular needs. These courses are taught in sections of about 100 students each, with an additional hour of discussion in groups of about 20 students. In our experience it is very difficult to organize these courses in such a way that students both learn something and are happy with the material presented. The main difficulty seems to come from the fact that a beginning programmer needs a lot of individual help, and this cannot be provided in large sections. We are now convinced that these courses cannot be improved within the current setup, and since enrollments in these courses are increasing, the situation is bound to grow worse unless something new is tried. We assume that the situation we have described is typical of many large universities.
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Digital Library
Index Terms
Automating introductory computer science courses
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Automating introductory computer science courses
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