Class Schedule, Reading List, and Project Milestones

Grading

Class Discussion: Think Pair Share

How Does It Work?
1) Think. The teacher provokes students' thinking with a question or prompt or observation. The students should take a few moments (probably not minutes) just to THINK about the question.

2) Pair. Using designated partners (such as with Clock Buddies), nearby neighbors, or a deskmate, students PAIR up to talk about the answer each came up with. They compare their mental or written notes and identify the answers they think are best, most convincing, or most unique.

3) Share. After students talk in pairs for a few moments (again, usually not minutes), the teacher calls for pairs to SHARE their thinking with the rest of the class. She can do this by going around in round-robin fashion, calling on each pair; or she can take answers as they are called out (or as hands are raised). Often, the teacher or a designated helper will record these responses on the board or on the overhead

Team Project

You will work in teams of four to six students in the same TA section. You should demonstrate that the proposed application is new and a unique creation. If you implement a feature that already exists or is very similar to an existing feature in any past or later version, it will be considered as plagiarism. When proposing a project, you should investigate whether it is feasible to implement and test it. You are expected to perform a live demonstration of your project during your project presentations. Students in the same team will not always receive the same grades, and project grades will account for individual effort and contribution. In each phase of the projects, students will rate and rank individual contributions within the teams and will rate the quality of projects for other teams. The teaching team will consider these peer evaluation reports when assigning individual grades. Your TAs will be in charge of setting project requirements and grading your projects. The instructor will also attend your midterm and final project presentations and provide additional assessments of your projects. Project activities will include the following but not limited to:

1. a new feature proposal and presentation (3%)
   
2. a midpoint implementation and testing progress report and presentation (10%)
   
3. a final demonstration and presentation (10%)
4. a youtube video about your project demo (5%): For example, you can take a look at sample videos created by my graduate students (Critics, LASE, Cookbook, RefDistiller)   
   
5. participation and peer evaluation (7%)
   

Quiz

Project report and presentation grading scheme

• 5 pt: Excellent design, complete implementation, selection of a task that is highly intellectually challenging, creative, concise yet comprehensive writing, nearly perfect answers, beautifully written and verbally communicated, eloquent presentation within a time limit
• 4 pt: Very good, mostly correct answers, i.e., >85%, selection of a intellectually challenging project topic, well written, good verbal presentation, well practiced presentation within a time limit
  
• 3 pt: Good understanding of the key concepts, mostly correct answers, i.e., >70%, selection of a intellectually challenging project topic, well written, good verbal presentation, well practiced presentation within a time limit
• 2 pt or 1pt: Poor, shallow, minimally sufficient, or needlessly wordy, key concepts misunderstood or missing, selection of easy project tasks, poor written and verbal communication, presentation over time, not following specified formats.
  

Feedback

During this course, I will be asking you to give me feedback on your learning in both informal and formal ways, e.g., including anonymous midpoint survey about how my teaching strategies are helping or hindering your learning. It is very important for me to know your reaction to what we are doing in the class, so I encourage you to respond to these surveys, ensuring that we can create an environment effective for teaching and learning.  Occasionally, at the end of the lecture, I will hand out index cards to ask "what is the most important thing you have learned in this class session?" and "what questions do you still have?" This feedback will be anonymous and this is to check your understanding and promote Q&A.

Academic Integrity

Each member of the university is expected to uphold these values through integrity, honesty, trust, fairness, and respect toward peers and community. In your first week, you must read and sign UCLA's Academic Integrity Statement.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Why aren't there many programming assignments? I want to improve my programming skill through this class.
My goal is to help you experience a software project life cycle by creating concrete artifacts in each stage. Thus, while software implementation is an important part of the life cycle, coding is not the main focus of this class. If you are excited about coding and want to practice more, please select a project with a significant implementation component or volunteer to play a key role in implementing your team project. I can also share pointers to open source projects, books, and references that could help you to practice your programming skills further.

Q: Why are we emphasizing theories (such as discrete math, logic, proof by induction, and program analysis) in a project-based software laboratory course?
I hope that you can not only get a good job as an entry level software engineer, but succeed in the future as a lead, principal engineer and architect. This requires you to have not only a solid coding skill but a theoretical foundation for systematic design, analysis, testing, and verification methods. In my opinion, these foundations cannot be easily attained while you are on the jobs; they are best taught at University.

Class Policy