BlogPost About the Year

This year of AP Comp Sci has definitely been a challenge for me. The material itself interests me, but the coding and mechanics of the subject proved to be too challenging for me to grasp. Starting from the 2nd six weeks, material started to become increasingly more difficult for me to grasp because I barely had a grasp on previous material and the course would not stop just for me. I should have came in for tutoring once I got behind, but I blew it aside because I thought I could catch up and there would be no problem, but I just got backlogged so far that even when I did come in for tutoring, things didn’t make sense because my foundation and basics of Java programming were sub par. I was able to grasp the logic behind the coding and presentations that Mr. Stephens and Tessler taught, but the free coding itself was the biggest challenge for me, because I couldn’t understand what all these special words and modifications of them did. I eventually tried to look up guides online, but those proved to be no help because it just confused my more and threw me further into a pit of confusion. I managed to get through the slew of worksheets and labs due to the tons of help we got from peers, and teachers. I think that the class isn’t too hard, but it definitely is a challenge that can be overcome if you are interested in the topic. In the beginning of the year, I was only curious about the topic, and now I realize I should’ve taken Computer Programming instead because I was not ready for the full course of AP Computer Science and its faster pace and more intense curriculum.

I do not regret taking this course, because it I was genuinely intrigued by the material and its core teachings, I just wasn’t prepared for the pace and intensity of the course. I liked how we had the liberty to work on our own projects and such, but I think that type of liberty made my work ethic plummet. Especially in the beginning of the school year, where I could easily to the system.out.println code, I thought the rest of the year would be just as easy so I didn’t buckle down as I should have. I pretty much enjoyed the entire course, but I would have enjoyed it much more if I actually understood Java coding thoroughly, and that wouldn’t have anything to do with Mr. Stephens teaching, just poorly executed on my accord.

Would I recommend this class to underclassmen? Most definitely; but only to those willing to give their full focus and effort to the class, and must at least have an interest in this sort of thing. I wish I had taken computer programming this year, because then I would have probably taken AP computer science next year, as a student who had previous encounters with coding and I’d be able to cope with the material more easily.

Thanks for putting up with me and Adam all year Mr. Stephens!

I’ll make sure to come back from time to time next year and say hi.

Unless you don’t want us to...

Cause we’re annoying.

<3

Week of March 31

This week we started playing with the GridWorld lab, where a grid would appear and you could interact with it in order to place bugs, rocks, and actors onto the field.  All these different drop down options were the actual different classes of the program that were made. Some examples of these classes were like the move() method and the turn method where you could turn the bug 45 degrees to the right and move the bug forward one step. Every time the bug moved forward it would leave a little flower in its trail and would darken after time. This program was really fun to use because we had the oppurtunity to both enjoy it and place like a million bugs onto the grid to see what would happen, and we also learned about how the different classes interacted with each other to create this alter world that had bugs and flowers and rocks and everything. Rocks were cool because if the bugs ran into any of them they would keep turning 45 degrees until it could continue going forward and would do so. We also started retroBug, a lab that was based off of bug but one that we personally wrote. This was a little more challenging because I'm really bad at freewriting java. Hopefully I"ll be able to improve though because although I'm not taking the AP test for computer science, I still find it somewhat interesting and I'll still try to learn what I can from the limited knowledge I already know and what we are taught the rest of the year, before and even after the AP.

Week of March 4 and March 11

March4
This week we started working with finches, a little computer creature that does actions based on our input through coding in JGrasp. During the sample program what happened was that the finch would do certain things based on how you manuvered the creature. For example, when you tilted the nose of the finch upwards, the program would continue to run, where the color of the nose would change and finish the program until it hit the end and then the nose of the finch would just constantly change colors (default mode). My partner and I attempted to get the Finch to do things to our bidding and we managed to scrap togetehr a program that got it to do what we wanted it to do before spring break. Earlier in the week we also went over sorting labs and the different types of sorting methods like bobo sort, switch sort, and other types of sorts. WE were shown different examples of the different sort methods and it helped get the concept of how all of the sortsr worked. This didn't really help with the code though because although I'm a visual learner, the code doesn't do anything to help me with my visual needs.

March 11
Over spring break I went to Italy with the school band. We went to Florence, Rome, Pisa, and a few other tourist attractions. Seeing the Colosseum  Leaning Tower of Pisa, and a few of Michelangelo's art pieces, it was a great experience. Europe is so much different from America where people are much closer to each other and they seem a lot more closely knit than in America where you have to use a vehicle to get anywhere.

Week of February 18

This week started out the week by having a review over sorting and comparable methods. Then we had the entire class period to finish work that we hadn't finished. This week we showed Mr. Tessler our finished Pong lab and we finished the 2nd part of the Locale lab with help from students and teacher. The 6 weeks test was a pain in the butt too because it was pretty challenging, where I scored 17 points out of a possible 25; 68%.. The free response was even more of a tragedy because I suck with free write problems in comp sci. Multiple choice questions make much more sense to me because I get the code in front of me and have a better idea of what's wrong and right. Worksheet interfaces and implement were assigned this week too. I ateempted to do it, but I think i'll have to redo it anyway. Coming in every Thursday so I can understand things...MAy have to come in more than once a week

Week of February 11, 2013

This week we continued working on our locale lab where we set the time and currency exchange rate for a certain country. We got a free response worksheet this week too and we were assigned to do it over the weekend. The free response looks pretty challenging but I'll look over the power point presentations and hopefully it will help me be able to understand what's going on in the worksheet. We had a quiz this week too, but I was gone for TMEA in San Antonio with the band. We have a six weeks test next Tuesday, and it is really intimidating. Im going to try and do well on it....Good luck to me! I've started coming in every Thursday to get help on Comp Sci, and it's slowly helping me get back on track.

February 4, 2013

This week we learned about abstract classes and codes and started the locale lab. The interfaces worksheet was given to us and that was pretty hard as well. I am finding ways to keep on trying to learn the material, but its just a big jumble in my head and I can't really connect things together. I've started coming in at lunch on Thursdays to get a better understanding of the material so I don't fall behind too much. I don't want to have anything lower than a B+ in this class because it IS an elective, and I'd feel really dumb if I didn't get anything lower than a high B. My grades this year haven't been the hottest, and i feel like I'm just finding ways to keep up with my classes and manage As and Bs. we were going finish the locale lab this week but weren't able to. We will finish next week and hopefully be caught up with all labs that we were supposed to have done

Week of Jan 28, 2013

This week we were supposed to finish the PONG lab. It was a huge pain because it took a bunch  of different labs together to create the entirety of the pong lab. We didn't actually understand part of the conceptual code writing until thursday though. This made it straining to 'finish' the lab on friday. We also learned about interfaces this week and that was kind of confusing to me as well, but I'm going to start comin in for tutoring at least once a week so I can be able to get the material and not fall behind in class. Pong was a hardd lab, and our program is kind of ghetto, but i think we did okay...Next week should be 'fun'. We got a packet of worksheets this week in clas and are expected to finish it by tuesday of next week. We need to score a 30% to on 2 out of 3 worksheets to be complete. It shouldn't be bad