What's Going On? January 2nd and January 3rd

Welcome Back!

I hope everyone had some time to rest and relax over winter break!  Hopefully, we are ready to tackle the rest of this semester!


App Development

This week, we will participate in our pre-unit hackwich called "Three Letter Word".  This app will
give students a taste of many of the elements that may be included in our final summative end-of-unit app challenge.







AP Computer Science A

This week, students will begin work on their "Create" performance task for the AP board.  Throughout the next several weeks, students will define their own project and have 12 hours of class time to program the project, reflect on its creation, and create a video highlighting its features.  This program will be submitted to the AP Board by April as part of the AP exam.




Programming the Web 1

This week, students will officially begin work on our final web site project.  For this, students must

create a website that contains a minimum of four web pages.  Students should demonstrate their knowledge of proper HTML and CSS techniques in order to format the content in an aesthically-pleasing way.  Students will have until the exam date to complete this project and any other work that they would like to have considered as part of their semester grade.  Students who have signed up for the transcripted course through WCTC will need to earn a "C" or higher for the course and complete the midterm and final projects.



Planning Ahead

Here is the first exam schedule for January 22nd through January 24th.

What's Going On? December 16th through December 20th

Winter Spirit Week!

This week, we will have a spirit week with different themed dress-up days.  On Friday, we will run a modified schedule and there will be an assembly with a student-staff volleyball game at the end of the day.  Please note: Tuesday is also club picture day.  Students should listen to the announcements and report to the auditorium when their group is called.

App Development 1

This week, students will be working on their summative end-of-unit app challenge, Word Play.  This is a Mad-Lib style app where the user is prompted to enter a few words on the first screen.  After a button is pressed, the user is taken to a second screen where the words are inserted into a story.  Students will turn in this assignment before leaving for winter break.

AP Computer Science Principles

This week, we will wrap up our lessons on modifying images in Python.  Students have now had some time to work with modifying an image pixel by pixel using numpy and by working with the entire image in the Python Imaging Library (PIL).





Programming the Web 1

This week, students will be wrapping up their work on assignment 14a.  Students will be creating their sub-pages for the Clear Reflections Website.  When the assignment is complete, students will host it live online.  Students should also be prepared to complete our ten multiple choice question assessment during class on Tuesday. 


Planning Ahead

For those of you who like to plan ahead, here is the semester exam schedule for January:

What's Going On? December 9th through December 13th

App Development

This week, students will focus on investigating the properties of segues and how to create multiple
view controllers for our apps.  We have already applied this feature once in our pre-unit hackwich called "Intergalactic Travel".  This week will focus on reinforcing those skills.






AP Computer Science Principles


This week, students will take a look at the Python Imaging Library, or PIL.  This will allow students
to manipulate images as a whole using filters as compared to last week when we were able to manipulate images pixel by pixel.  Students will learn how to round the corners and place a frame around all images contained with in a folder.





Programming the Web 1

This week, students will learn about how to take their webpages that have been created locally on
their computers and learn how to host their pages live online on a web server.  Students will learn about the different components associated with hosting a page and will place their completed "Clear Reflections Photography" four page website online.



January Exam Schedule

For those of you who like to plan ahead, check out our exam schedule for January:

What's Going On? December 2nd through December 6th

App Development

This week, we will focus on two important programming concepts: classes and inheritance.  A class is a program-code template used for creating objects.  Essentially, a class sets up a blueprint for how to create something new.  For example, a simple BankAccount class would have some basic information about each client in the bank, including the person's name, account number, and balance.  When we create a new BankAccount object, we would fill it with specific details about a specific client.  The BankAccount class provides the template for how we can create users and work with their data.  Along with this week, students will have a "Classes Playground Reading", a coding challenge, as well as a formative quiz.  Once we wrap up our work with classes, we will work with "Inheritance".  This allows for specific details from one class to be passed down to other classes.  For example, a CheckingAccount class might use, or inherit, all of the information provided in the BankAccount class, plus add its own features such as keeping track of check numbers.



AP Computer Science Principles

We will start off this week by talking about abstraction and its role in programming.  With abstraction, we are able to use things without knowing exactly what makes them work.  For example, a person can drive a car without knowing the specifics of how an engine works.  This is an important concept to understand as students will need to know how to apply it for our AP Create Performance task.  We will spend the rest of the week applying this concept by manipulating images in Python. 

Programming the Web 1

This week, students will work on their web assignment 13A.  Students will be creating the "Clear Reflections Photography" homepage.  This assignment allows students to practice the skill of formatting images for the web in Photoshop as well as practice the skill of creating layouts using CSS.  Along with this week, students will turn in the reading guide for our textbook reading on Tuesday and complete 10 multiple choice questions on Friday.

What's Going On? November 25th and November 26th

Happy Thanksgiving!

Due to the Thanksgiving Holiday, we will have classes on Monday and Tuesday with a break Wednessday through Friday.  Monday will be a "Monday-style" schedule with AE and Tuesday will be a "purple-style" schedule without AE.







App Development

This week, students will wrap up their third summative end-of-unit app challenge, Tip Calculator.  Students will need to complete their reflections and show off their working apps.  Students will receive two grades for the assignment: one for application development (the code) and one for application design (how the app looks).

AP Computer Science Principles

This week, students will wrap up their work on lesson 1.3, our introduction to Python.  Students will need to submit our assignment on the "for loop", as well as our "while loop" activity.  We will also spend some time looking at some sample AP test questions related to loops.  Since the AP test is "language-neutral", it is important to see how test questions will be presented.

Programming the Web 1

This week, we will dive into how to properly format images for web sites.  We will analyze the major photo types that are supported by web browsers, practice modifying them in photoshop, and then apply our design skills when we return from our Thanksgiving break.

What's Going On? November 18th through November 22nd

App Development 

Monday's class will be devoted to wrapping up our work with conditionals and a brief discussion on "scope" of a variable.  During the rest of the week, students will work on their third summative app challenge of the semester, "Tip Calculator".  For this app, students will calculate the 10%, 15%, 20%, and 25% tip for a restaurant bill.  Students looking to expand on this app will focus on figuring out how to evenly split a check between a designated number of people.  Students will be assessed on two major components of this app: creating functional code and creating an aesthetically pleasing design.





Programming the Web 1

This week, students will dive into lesson 12.  Along with this week, students will read chapters 17 and 19 and complete the accompanying reading guide to help identify the important concepts from the chapters.  During class on Friday, students will complete our 10 multiple choice review questions.  STUDENTS ARE ENCOURAGED TO PRE-PLAN THEIR ANSWERS FOR THIS SUMMATIVE.  Additionally, students will have one web page, assignment 12A, to complete in order to practice the ability to create a page using responsive web design.




AP Computer Science A

This week, students will continue our study of the Python programming language.  Students will focus on looping structures, such as the while loop and the for loop.  Along with this week, students will complete activities 1.3.6 and 1.3.7.

What's Going On? November 11th through November 15th

App Development


This week, we will wrap up our discussion on functions.  Students will spend time during class on Monday writing our fourth installment on our technical blog about functions.  Students will define functions, describe the elements of a function header, and describe how to use/call a function.

Next, we will turn our attention to conditional statements.  Students will spend time practicing how to evaluate a condition and writing algorithms based on defined criteria.  Along with our conditionals study, students will take part in a code challenge, a formative assessment, and another technical blog post.



AP Computer Science Principles

This week, we will continue our study of the Python programming language.  Students will spend
some time working with Strings, lists, and tuples.  Toward the end of the week, students will be introduced to some looping structures.  Students will also participate in some practice AP exam questions to help us prepare for the AP exam in May.





Programming for the Web 1

This week, students will continue studying different ways to design layouts using CSS.  During class
on Monday, we will focus on "flexbox".  The flexbox will make it easier for us to design a responsive layout without using the concepts of float and positioning that we focused on during lesson 9.

During the first part of the week, students will participate in a practice exercise that will introduce us to the concept of designing layouts using a flexible container.  Along with this week, students should complete their reading guides by the start of class on Monday and we will take our lesson 9 review questions during class on Thursday.  During class on Thursday and Friday, we will talk about several different ways to design a layout using CSS.