Pen and Paper Coding

As the course name indicates, we will only be using pen and paper for this class (i.e., no computers). This might sound a bit strange for a programming class, but the reason is that this method forces students to act both as the programmer (writing the code) and as the computer(executing the code), which is a great way to learn programming. In addition, it removes some of the unnecessarily technical aspects of using a computer too early on, which can be dealt with more efficiently once the student has the fundamentals down.

The end goal is for students to be able to “think in code” and be able to translate real world concepts into language a computer can understand.

So, what will we actually be doing in class?

The goals of this course are ambitious, and the curriculum covers a lot of the materials taught in a typical “Programming 101” course at computer science departments around the world.

Each class will introduce several new programming concepts, and each of these concepts will be practiced in depth using exercises that the students will work on in-class.

One of the primary objectives of the course is to get you to start “thinking in code”.