Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information from Alfred Thompson
Alfred Thompson's blog about teaching computer science at the K-12 level. Alfred was a high school computer science teacher for 8 years. He has also taught grades K-8 as a computer specialist.
Cryptography is Hard
I love stories like this - https://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/03/22/ba_jihadist_trial_sentencing/...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 04/06/2011
After The APCS Exam
The Advanced Placement Computer Science exam is just about a month away. While for most schools this...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 04/05/2011
Interesting Links 4 April 2011
I always worry about posting things on April 1st. So I didn’t post anything last Friday. I could say...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 04/04/2011
Rock Paper Scissors Takes To The Cloud
Rock Paper Scissors is a fun little project I have talked about before (most recently at...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/31/2011
Interesting Projects–A Collection
It seems as though teachers are always looking for new projects to use with students. Projects get...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/29/2011
Interesting Links 28 March 2011
I didn’t travel away from home all last week. It was great to catch up on a lot of things but...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/28/2011
Could Taking A Computer Science Course Change Your Life?
Well it did mine. And Mark Guzdial ha a post last week in which he told two stories of young women...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/26/2011
FREE Microsoft Certification Exam Vouchers For Students
College student, high school student, any kind of student – sooner or later you will be...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/24/2011
US Imagine Cup People’s Choice Awards
The Imagine Cup is the premier student technology competition in he world. Yeah, I get excited about...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/23/2011
Object Oriented Programming is Dead
OK perhaps not dead but Robert Harper, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, says(Teaching FP...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/22/2011
Programming Projects Using Arrays
Not long ago someone posted a query to the AP CS list serve looking for projects that use arrays for...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/22/2011
Interesting Links Post 21 March 2011
My travel is over for a couple of weeks. Well, about three weeks. Then I will be headed out to...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/21/2011
Whack Something Game for Windows Phone 7
The last several yeas the University of New Hampshire has put on a “Hi Tech” day for area high...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/18/2011
Kodu Cup 2011
Create a new game with Kodu and you could win $5,000 for yourself and your school and lots of great...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/17/2011
Rebirth of DIY Software Development
In the heady, exciting, almost wild West atmosphere of the early days of PCs it seemed like almost...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/16/2011
Heuristics–Programs that Learn
How do we learn? How do we develop strategy in games, in work, in our daily lives? We store...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/15/2011
Interesting Links 14 March 2011
This highlight of my week last week was being in Dallas Texas for SIGCSE. This is by far my favorite...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/14/2011
Python Tools for Visual Studio
Microsoft has just released the Python Tools for Visual Studio add-in (Beta) . This add-in lets...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/12/2011
Webcast Series for K-12 educators and teacher recognition program
I received the following from the Microsoft Innovative Educators program today and thought it was...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/11/2011
Resources for Teaching Security
I’ve been at SIGCSE this week and trying to soak up as much new things as I can. Today I ran into a...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/10/2011
What Is Computer Science All About
One of the big questions that comes up time and again is “what is computer science all...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/10/2011
CS Principles AP Course Pilots Wanted
As many of you know there is a new AP CS course, APCS Principles, under development. A second round...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/09/2011
Free Pluralsight On-demand Training via Dreamspark
Microsoft is constantly adding software and other benefits to the DreamSparak program. The latest of...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/08/2011
Dream. Build. Play. is back for 2011
Honestly if you are a student you REALLY want to enter the Imagine Cup game development competition....
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/06/2011
New XNA Jump Start Mini-course
Microsoft recently released a new XNA Jump Start Mini-course. Programming with C# and XNA 0.5: Jump...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/03/2011
The Body As Mouse
Hopefully you have heard of the Kinect for Xbox 360 by now. Perhaps you even have one. Millions of...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/03/2011
The Credit Card Project
I’m a firm believer that programming projects are best when they are about things that are...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 03/01/2011
Interesting Links 28 February 2011
Lots of interesting posts by computer science teachers last week. And some news from various sources...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/28/2011
FizzBuzz–A Programming Question
Projects or exercises that lend themselves to many different “correct” solutions are...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/24/2011
Important News For Imagine Cup Game Teams - 2011
I know that a lot of you have been working hard on games. I know that many of you who read this blog...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/23/2011
Teaching, Learning and the Job Interview
I was reading a blog post by a college professor the other day (Preparing CS students for...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/22/2011
Interesting Links 21 February 2011
I spent several days in New York City as part of the program committee for CSTA’s Computer Science...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/21/2011
What Does Watson Mean?
Researchers at and working with IBM have created a computer and software that played and beat the...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/18/2011
New Software on DreamSpark
Dreamspark is all about free development software for students. This week we added six new or...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/17/2011
Computing Education and Education Reform
One of my frustrations these days is that with all the talk of education reform there is not much...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/15/2011
Interesting Links 14 February 2011
Happy Valentines Day! Surely there is some appropriate computer project or connection for the day...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/14/2011
Microsoft Innovative Educator Teacher Professional Development
The Microsoft Innovative Educator program at Microsoft is offering a number of two-day seminars for...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/08/2011
Making the Case for Becoming a Computer Science Teacher
Mark Guzdial asks the question What’s the argument for becoming a computer science teacher? on his...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/07/2011
Interesting Links 7 February 2011–TCEA Notes
I spent the weekend in Miami for a meeting of a joint ACM and IEEE committee working on a...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/07/2011
Kindergarten Computer Science
Well actually Karen North, an energetic elementary school computer science teacher and a friend of...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/04/2011
To Hack or Not to Hack
The other day I solved a problem in a slightly out of the box way. That is to say that it worked but...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/03/2011
Prototypes from Microsoft Education Labs
Microsoft Education Labs is a sort of technology playground for the Microsoft Education Products...
Author: Alfred Thompson Date: 02/02/2011