LA HARBOR COLLEGE
Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) Assessment Report
Course Assessment
Division: Math
Discipline/Program:
Computer Science Information Technology
Course Number and Name: COSCI 344 Introduction to Java
Program Contact Person: __Lora Lane______________________________________ Phone: x4178
Reviewed by:
Date: January 2014
Note: SLOs changed to reflect course outcomes in statewide descriptors.
Institutional Learning
Outcomes
2
Course Intended
Outcomes
1. Design an algorithm
and use a Java IDE to
create, edit, compile and
run the program.
Means of Assessment and Criteria for Success
Summary of Data Collected
In an in-class exercise, students were given a
description for a complex hospital IV program.
They were asked to form teams of 3-4 students
and submit a structure chart for the design. This
could be either hand-drawn or in Word. They
were then to use the IDE to draft the program
with stubs and drivers. The coding was divided
up between group members to do.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
Criteria: In the limited class period, the groups
were not expected to code the entire program. 23 fully coded methods were sufficient. 80% of
students will score 70% or better.
Students wanted to go directly
to writing code and to skip the
design part. Some expressed
frustration with designing and
coding with others. It was a
lively and interactive class
session. One student who
already worked in industry
came up to me after class and
said that he felt that what we
had done that day was
incredibly important.
2 students did not submit the
work, 21 did. 3 students
scored 40% as they missed
class and submitted only the
design. The rest scored 100%.
Use of Results
This was the first time a group
problem was used in class to
enforce design. In the lead-in, I
talked about how “real”
commercial programs are written
by teams of people. This
corresponded with a section in the
textbook on abstraction and
stepwise refinement. From my
observation, it was a success,
although students probably
disliked the process. Next time I
will ask for self-reflective
feedback.
Very little design was required for
other programming assignments. In
the future, students should be
asked to submit a design with
programs. This may help to deal
with the increasing problem of
students locating and copying
solutions from the Internet and
from each other.
Also incorporate more team
programming exercises into the
class so students get more
experience working together and
2
2
2
2. Write programs to get
input from a user, store
in a variable and display
output
3. Write arithmetic and
Boolean expressions
considering order of
operations.
4. Write programs
using if, if/else, switch
and conditional
statements.
In Assignment 13, students were asked to create
a Java program to simulate a coin toss game.
The game needed to get and store a guess from
the user and output if the guess was correct or
not. It also needed to store and output a
summary of game results at the end.
Criteria: 70% of students will score 3 out of 5 or
better according to a department rubric.
In Assignment 13, students were asked to create
a Java program to simulate a coin toss game.
The game needed keep a count of the number of
games played and the results.
Criteria: 70% of students will score 3 out of 5 or
better according to a department rubric.
In Assignment 13, students were asked to create
a Java program to simulate a coin toss game.
The game needed to get and store a guess from
the user and output if the guess was correct or
not. An if statement was needed to check for
valid input. The program also needed to
determine if the toss was a head or tail and
match that to the appropriate string value.
Criteria: 70% of students will score 3 out of 5 or
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
13 students turned in the
assignment. 9 out of 13 scored
3 or better (69%). The ones
that scored lower did not
complete the entire
assignment. The average score
was 3. Most students did not
perform error checking on the
input and did not customize
the output to account for
results of 0, 1 or more.
10 students did not complete
this assignment. 7 of those had
stopped participating in the
class.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
13 students turned in the
assignment. 11 out of 13
scored 3 or better (92%). The
ones that scored lower did not
complete the entire
assignment. The average score
was 4. Some students did not
use ++ where applicable,
instead using +1.
10 students did not complete
this assignment. 7 of those had
stopped participating in the
class.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
13 students turned in the
assignment. 11 out of 13
scored 3 or better (92%). The
ones that scored lower did not
complete the entire
assignment. The average score
dividing up coding.
The results were good for the
students who submitted the
complete program. Next time more
emphasis will be place on error
checking and helpful output in
earlier assignments. Students were
not specifically instructed to error
check nor to customize the output.
I felt that they should have known
to do this by so late in the class.
Retention is still a problem to be
solved. 29 students submitted the
first assignment. Only a third
submitted Assignment 13. It was
the next to last assignment before
the final project.
As self-reported in an introductory
discussion, the students’ reasons
for taking the class were:
Chemistry Major – 1
Physics Major – 1
Engineering Major – 6
Computer Science Major – 19
Job Skills or Other – 2
At least 4 of the students listed
under computer science indicated
that they were taking the class to
see if computer science was an
acceptable major.
Of the students who completed
Assignment 13, all but one
indicated an interest in majoring in
Computer Science or Computer
Engineering. The other was
Chemistry.
Anecdotally, the students described
struggling with a heavy course
load of math, chemistry and
physics along with the Java course.
Attendance was poor near the end
better according to a department rubric.
2
2
2
5. Write programs
using while, do while
and for loops.
6. Write and call
methods with and
without parameters and
return values
7. Write programs
utilizing arrays.
In Assignment 13, students were asked to create
a Java program to simulate a coin toss game.
The game was to repeat until the user entered a
sentinel value.
Criteria: 70% of students will score 3 out of 5 or
better according to a department rubric.
In Assignment 13, students were asked to create
a Java program to simulate a coin toss game.
The game required a class with methods for
tossing the coin, returning the side up as an
integer and returning the side up as a string. It
also required a constructor. The game in main
called these methods.
Criteria: 70% of students will score 3 out of 5 or
better according to a department rubric.
In Assignment 11, students were asked to
complete two array problems in an online
system called MyProgrammingLab (MPL). The
problems involved searching for an item in an
array and locating adjacent duplicates.
They were also asked to write a program with a
method to merge two lists.
was 4. There were some
inefficiencies in how the
statements were written.
10 students did not complete
this assignment. 7 of those had
stopped participating in the
class.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
13 students turned in the
assignment. 9 out of 13 scored
3 or better (77%). The ones
that scored lower did not
complete the entire
assignment. The average score
was 4.
10 students did not complete
this assignment. 7 of those had
stopped participating in the
class.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
13 students turned in the
assignment. 11 out of 13
scored 3 or better (92%). The
ones that scored lower did not
complete the entire
assignment. The average score
was 4.
10 students did not complete
this assignment. 7 of those had
stopped participating in the
class.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
21 students turned in the
assignment with varying
degrees of completion. 2
students did not submit it.
of the semester, even with
participation credit assignments
that needed to be completed each
meeting. Upon searching the
Internet, I found complaints of
non-attendance in Computer
Science even at Harvard and
Stanford!
The class met from 7-10:10 one
night per week and students
expressed tiredness and hunger.
Some possibilities to try:
- Meeting twice a week
- Offering the class as hybrid, half
in-class and half online
- Flipping the coursework instead
of lecturing in class. Some students
asked for tutoring, which is not
available for technical courses.
Flipping might serve this need
allowing for group work and more
individual time with me.
Next time, survey the students
about their workload and hours
spent on the class. Is it a time
problem or difficulty of the
material?
The students completed the MPL
portion at a higher rate and did
better on it. This was the first
semester MPL was used in Java
with the Introduction to Java
Programming textbook by Y.
Daniel Liang. MPL is an
interactive environment that gives
Criteria: 70% of students will score 70% or
better.
On the MPL part, all students
scored 100% but one. That
student did not complete both
problems.
On the programming part, 4
students did not complete it.
Out of the 17 who did, 12
scored 70% or better (71%).
Of the 5 who scored below
70%, 3 did not make any
significant progress on the
problem or the code didn’t
compile. It looked like the
others tried to find something
similar on the Internet and
copy it.
2
8. Design and code
classes with
constructors, public and
private methods, and
state variables, then use
them to instantiate
objects.
In Assignment 13, students were asked to create
a Java program to simulate a coin toss game.
The game required a class with constructors and
methods. The game implemented in main
created a coin and called these methods.
Criteria: 70% of students will score 3 out of 5 or
better according to a department rubric.
Fall 2013, one W evening
face-to-face section.
13 students turned in the
assignment. 10 out of 13
scored 3 or better (85%). The
ones that scored lower did not
students instant feedback and
debugging help with solutions.
Anecdotally, through my
observations of students working
and from complaints expressed to
me, I find that students initially
have a little trouble understanding
MPL’s cues. They adapt to it after
a couple of weeks. Next time the
course is taught with MPL, survey
the students about their experience
with MPL.
A difficulty with MPL is that some
of the solutions seem to be posted
on the web (not always correct).
This is a growing problem with all
coding assignments. I have noticed
students in class immediately
searching for a solution online
instead of working out the
algorithm and code themselves.
Often the solutions they find do
not quite match the problem as
assigned or use features of the
language not yet covered. Before
assigning work, I must look online
first to see what is out there. I will
contact the publisher with my MPL
concerns.
In the second part, the coding
assignment, most students got it
working but I was disappointed
that they did not use predefined
methods for working with arrays
provided in the language. Next
time emphasize the importance of
making use of available tools.
See description above for SLOs 26
complete the entire
assignment. The average score
was 4.
10 students did not complete
this assignment. 7 of those had
stopped participating in the
class.
Date: January 9, 2010
Overview: The assessment was conducted in Fall 2009 with one online section. The class started with a maximum enrollment of 31. It dropped rapidly to 15 by the 4 th week. 13
students turned in the 4th week assignment. COSCI 344 is a very technical class with Math 123C as a recommended prerequisite. Of the 10 students enrolled at the end of the class,
8 passed with a C or better.
Attach additional pages as necessary.
Institutional Learning
Outcomes
2
2
2
2
Course Intended Outcomes
1. Carry out activities in the
program creation process; design,
code, compile and debug.
2. Choose the appropriate data type
of structure for a problem and code
it in a program.
3. Choose a suitable control
structure and code it in a program.
4. Design a variety of classes
using object oriented principles
and implement them in programs.
2
5. Use predefined classes in
programs.
2
6. Utilize an array to code a
solution to a repetitive problem.
Means of Assessment and Criteria
for Success
In the final exam project, students
were asked to create a JAVA program.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
In the final exam project, students
were asked to create a JAVA program
and had to create, modify, and output
different types of data.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
In the final exam project, students
were asked to create a JAVA program
that contains complex looping and
nested decisions.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
In Module 13, students created a Java
program that uses classes and passes
data.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
In the final exam project, students
were asked to create a JAVA program
that uses predefined classes.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
In Module 9, students were asked to
create a JAVA program that contains
an array. They placed and accessed
the data in the array.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
Summary of Data Collected
Use of Results
There were 8 final exam
submissions. 100% of the
students scored 70% or better.
SLO #4 was the lowest scoring
assessment at 75%. While above
our department rubric standards, it
indicates more time should be
spent on object oriented principles.
100% of the students scored
70% or better.
100% of the students scored
70% or better.
There were 8 submissions.
100% of the students scored
70% or better.
100% of the students scored
70% or better.
9 out of 10 enrolled students
completed the assignment.
100% of these students scored
70% or better.
SLO #7 will be measured by file
output the next time it is assessed.
The students who remained in the
class until the end did very well (6
A’s). The two who did not pass
stopped turning in assignments
near the end but were passing up
until that point.
Increasing the retention rate is a
goal. We need to find out why the
students are dropping out and try to
provide assistance if possible. The
ones that persisted tended to have a
technical goal.
As self-reported in an introductory
discussion, their majors were:
Computer Engineering (1)
Business/Information Technology
(3)
Computer Science (3)
Electrical Engineering (1)
Psychology (1)
UC Transfer (1)
Of the students who participated in
the discussion and dropped later,
the majors were:
2
7. Write a program that reads
input data from a file or keyboard
and formats it for output to the
screen or file.
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
In the final exam project, students
were asked to create a JAVA program
that reads from the keyboard and
outputs to the display.
Criteria: 70% of students will score
70% or better according to a
department rubric.
100% of the students scored
70% or better.
Psychology (2)
Computer Engineering (1)
Civil Engineering (1)
Undecided (2)
Computer Science (1)
Computer Technology (1)
Fire Technology (1)