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Course analysis for Software Development Prutt06

for I, E and Media, Period 4 2006

Up to Course home page period 4 2006.

Below is a course analysis for the course Software Development for I, E and Media. In the text we refer to a new course analysis developed in collaboration with student course representatives.

Course data

Course	2D1385 Software Development for I, E and Media. (4p)
Examination	Lab1 G/U (2p), Lab2-6: 3/4/5 (2p)
Course period	Period 4 2006
Lectures	24 h
Exercises	12 h (6 st)
Labs (timetabled)	14 h
Coursebook	Braude, Software Design, Wiley, 2003.
Number of students	120
Number of exercise groups	2 (7 weeks)
Finished lab 1 050519	94% (last year 98%)
Finished lab 2 050519	92% (last year 96%)
Prestationsgrad 050421	79% have completed the course (completed all labs and passed exam) (last year 73%?)
Examinationsgrad 050421	80% have passed the exam, either as tenta or omtenta. (last year 64%?)
Course teacher	Karl Meinke
Exercise class teachers	Karl Meinke, Lars Arvestad

Course Evaluation Form

26 students completed a course evaluation during the second to last lecture. (Paper format). This represents just 21% (last year 26%) of students taking the course, so the results are not necessarily representative. A total of 22 questions were discussed, and we present only the most significant below, followed by some student comments. Below, 5 represents highest approval and 1 represents lowest approval.

What overall grade would you give the course? 3.17
What overall grade would you give the lectures? 3.00
What overall grade would you give the examples classes? 3.25.
Did the lab exercises feel important and relevant for the course? 3.73
What grade would you give the course homepage? 3.40.

Comments

Here are a selection of comments, several of these, e.g shortage of lab assistants, came up many times:

"Bra hemsida"
"Flera assar behövs"
"Hemtentan: det är svårare när alla frågor bygger så mycket på varandra. Vore schysstare med uppdelade frågor"
"Jag tyckte att det var en rolig och intressant kurs"
"Föreläsningarna var lite för långsamma"
"Lite för snabba genomgångar på föreläsningar"
"Bra föreläsare, bra föreläsning"
"Det har varit alldeles för få övningar"
"Det är en god ide att deltagerna ska aktiveras och hjälpa till att lösa problem"

Summary

The results for labs 1 and 2 are slightly worse than last year. But overall, lab and exam performance are significantly better than last year. This may have been improved by removing one of the labs for technical reasons.

Goals

According to the study handbook, the goals of the course are:

to cover important software development concepts
emphasis development concepts for OO.
experience of modelling and development of larger programs

We also cover significant new concepts such as the XP development model, network programming and XML. The aim is to make the course up to date and interesting.

Changes made to the course

The course lecture notes were translated into english and completely rewritten using better examples from the literature (patterns etc.) UML was used as a common theme/language for the course notes. This involved considerable effort!
More time was spent on UML modelling during exercise classes. Afterwards, the quality of UML modelling required for the labs was raised.
More details of UML were covered in lectures. Software lifecycle models were covered in more depth, as were OO programming principles (LSP etc). Cryptography was dropped from the course, and software frameworks were deemphasised, to make more room.

Actual course contents

Changes to the course notes meant that several shifts of emphasis were made in the course. UML, patterns, software lifecycles, threads and OO programming principles increased in significance. Cryptography, frameworks, beans decreased. All other aspects were unchanged. The structure of each class can be found att lecture contents.

Reflections on this years course

Unreliable lab assistants made lab examination much slower and harder than it should have been. This was the most significant course complaint by far.

Some students want more exercise classes. However the number of scheduled classes seems fixed here.

Generally the lab exercises are well appreciated.

Intended Changes for next year

The course notes will be tightened up to remove minor subjects and focus on core material.
I will try to engage more reliable lab assistants. Severe problems were caused by assistants not turning up.
I will try to make the course slides more concise, and add some overview material to tie the subjects together.
I need to thing more about increasing active student work on material that will appear in the exams.

Appendix: Course Description

Upp till kurssidan VT06.

Sidansvarig: <karlm@nada.kth.se>
Last changed 12 December 2006
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