Welcome! Our first class session is Wednesday, May 24 from 5:15-8:15 p.m.

Be sure to thoroughly read the syllabus as soon as possible.

The readings, site registrations and software installations below must be completed by Sunday, May 21 at 5 p.m. The analysis post is due by Monday, May 22 by 10 p.m.

• • Required: *** Complete this survey ***
  • Required: Reading/watch
    • How the Internet works
    • Timeline of software languages
    • Timeline of networking and the web
    • Computational thinking and journalism: part 1 and part 2
    • WordPress software philosophy
    • GNU free software philosophy
    • Unix philosophy
    • The Zen of Python
    • The Pragmatic Programmer Quick Reference Guide
• Required free software**:

• • Download and install Sublime Text
  • Create a free GitHub account
  • Download and install GitHub for Mac or GitHub for Windows and connect it to your GitHub account
• Required: Write analysis post that includes why these ideas matter, what you found most interesting and your main takeaways from topics discussed
  • Include a link to your GitHub profile in the post

**Notes on required software:

• These three programs must be downloaded and installed before the first class to be sure you can hit the ground running.
• If you have problems installing that you can’t resolve by searching online, please contact the instructor as soon as possible.
• After you install them, you don’t have to start using them before class starts, but you’re encouraged to explore what they do and why we’ll be using them.
• Important: Don’t change any MAMP or XAMPP settings unless instructed.

Everyone will receive an individual login for this WordPress site so you can submit the analysis post. If you haven’t used WordPress before, please see the first section on how to post. Be sure to:

• Add a title that briefly describes the content, themes, etc. of your post
• Under “Categories,” check the box for “2017 Summer class”
• Under “Tags,” add one called week0 — with no spaces between week and zero (it will be one of the suggested options when you starting typing “week”). After that you can add other tags that are relevant to what you discuss in your post (e.g. history of programming, computational thinking, etc.)
• If you don’t want your post’s content publicly viewable on the course blog, please change the “visibility” to “password protected” in the publish box (top-right of the post edit page; see instructions) and enter the password I sent by email. That way everyone in class can read it, but not the wider web.
• Change the status to “pending review” and save

Be sure to subscribe to the blog to get all the updates posted here:

After you submit, I’ll read your post and send individual feedback as an “Editorial Comment” (e.g. if I mention any feedback, corrections, copy edits, etc. needed). This is feature made possible by the EditFlow (editorial workflow) plugin. You can reply with another editorial comment and let me know the changes have been made and I can publish.

If there are no corrections or edits you need to make, I’ll make any more conversational comments publicly so others can see and contribute to the discussion.

Update, 5/21/17

In addition to what’s in the syllabus, about about analysis posts:

Analysis/update posts (~300-400 words, 11 total): For assigned readings and self-learning, write reactions and highlight what you found most interesting or had questions about on the course blog. These posts should be a mix of synthesis to show your understanding of the material as well as like a journal of your progress (here’s what I did, here’s what I’m going to do, here’s what hurdles exist, etc.). These are generally due a day after the assignment is due so you have time to reflect on what you learned. Due: Mondays by 10 p.m., unless otherwise specified

Here is some additional information:

The weekly analysis posts don’t need to touch on every single thing covered, especially this time because there was such a variety of material. Ideally, in the case of a reading/video, a post will explore a particular theme or topic you found most interesting. Choose one (or a few) things and go into more depth.

In the future, if most of the work assigned one week is skills-based or project-based, you can reflect on that experience. Also, as mentioned in the syllabus excerpt, those assignments will be when you want to talk about progress you’ve made and any hurdles.

Some brief explanation can be ok, but definitely avoid summarization for the analysis posts. You don’t have to prove you read everything — if that was the case we’d have quizzes 🙂

The point is to do one or more of the following — or something along these lines:

• analyze the materials
• find connections between the materials within a given week (or, in the future, between weeks)
• relate something to your experience (how it could help you, how it enlightened you about something, etc)

If you’ve already submitted, feel free to re-work your post before the first class if you’d like to explore a few things in more detail.

Also, be sure to link back to the materials you reference in your post.

Please let me know if you have any questions by email or in the comments below. I look forward to meeting everyone at the first session of class!