[Year 12 Its] A radical approach to the course

Sun Apr 2 20:16:51 EST 2006

Hello Kevork

I was not having a go at anybody with my comment re exam prep. In fact I
agreed that we are 'forced' to do it in the best interests of our students
re maxmising their chance of success in the exams.
What I was lamenting was the fact that all the fantastic work you describe
is not given the fair weight that it should - all it is used for is to rank
students (and one small philosophical point here - if all students in a
class successfully solve a problem in creative and imagintive ways and meet
all the conditions imposed upon them in doing it, then why shouldn't they be
all ranked at the same level? answer: that won't put them on a ladder for
the ENTER.) When it's all said and done, the exam counts for most if not
all, and is driving the teaching of the course.
In response to your other comments, I would also add that the relationship
of coursework to the exam is hampered by a number of things including the
highly generic nature of the study design, not just in software, but also
other 'theoretical' areas, such as how deeply does one goes into the study
of ROM technology (do we just teach the functional and/or operational
difference between ROM, RAM,and other storage devices, do we go down to the
level of exploring the difference between ROMs, PROMs, EPROMs, EEPROMs,...
or do we look at the different ROM technologies that allow the different
speeds to exists??)
Personally, as far as course structure is concerned I am in favour of
winding back the clock and going back to CATs (which I do not believe were
ever a problem in IT as far as authentication was concerned, or as far as
students giving up because they went over too great a period) and an exam
that covers a specific area of the course (as opposed to open slather on
everything). This way students do real projects that are valuable
experiences in their own right and that are valued  as far as assessment is
concerned, but they still have to demonstrate that they have gained a
theoretical understanding of something in IT.

Regards
Robert T-A

----- Original Message -----
From: "Kevork Krozian" <kevork at edulists.com.au>
To: "Year 12 Information Technology Systems Teachers' Mailing List"
<is at edulists.com.au>
Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2006 6:00 PM
Subject: Re: [Year 12 Its] A radical approach to the course

> Hi Robert,
>
>     Consider the following as part of the IT Systems course over the 3
terms
> that school based learning and assesment is carried out :
>
>  1. High end programming tasks in a true object oriented language such as
> Java using both primitive and advanced data structures such as arrays,
> records, arrays of records, vectors, writing to and retrieving from disk
> files in both text and binary formats, building of truly intuitive GUIs
with
> menus, controls and validation such as drop down lists, process validation
> with activation or deactivation of controls bases on actions on the GUI
etc
> etc
>  2. Building real networks as part of the networking SACs (SAC31 and
SAC42)
> using cisco routers, switches, switching routers as used in SOHOs as well
as
> larger organisations, setting up wireless access points, configuring
> security for these and demonstrating how simple 128bit wireless encryption
> can be hacked in 3 minutes, demonstrating firewalls and configuration of
> these.
>  3. Carrying out SDLC examples using the case studies supplied by VITTA CD
,
> amongst others as offered on the lists
>  4. Teaching IT Systems students who are also Cisco CCNA students with
> average scores of 95% for Cisco networking assessment tasks.
>
>   and the students who average 96 - 97 % in these SACs score a final study
> score of 38 - 40 meaning there are a further 8% of the IT Systems cohort
who
> are higher performers in the Study of Information Systems ( score of 40
> meaning you are in the top 8% of performance in that subject )
>   Can anyone maybe explain how this happens if not for lack of working out
> the types of answers the examiners prefer ?
>
> Best Wishes
> Kevork Krozian
> Mailing List Creator and Administrator
> kevork at edulists.com.au
> www.edulists.com.au
> Tel: 0419 356 034
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Robert Timmer-Arends" <timmer at melbpc.org.au>
> To: "Year 12 Information Technology Systems Teachers' Mailing List"
> <is at edulists.com.au>
> Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2006 5:54 PM
> Subject: Re: [Year 12 Its] A radical approach to the course
>
>
> > Hello Keith
> >
> > I agree that lots of exam practice produces results, but yes, I am
saying
> > that
> >
> >> conquering the challenge of good exam technique is not a 'good' use of
> >> educational endeavour.
> >
> > At least not in the amount of time it consumes in relation to what
> > (ideally)
> > we are trying to teach. While I agree that being able to quickly
assemble
> > a
> > lot of facts and put together a coherent response is a useful faculty to
> > have, surely there are more educationally sound ways of doing this.
> > Moreover, I am not so sure that the over emphasis on exam technique does
> > "significantly better (prepare students) for many other challenges that
> > life
> > will throw up at them in their future social and working lives." -
> > perhaps,
> > as others have noted, it does for university, but then that perhaps says
> > something about university as well!
> >
> > (the soap box could get a little crowded - or should we bring our own?)
> >
> > Regards
> > Robert T-A
> > Brighton SC
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > http://www.edulists.com.au
> > IT Systems Mailing List kindly supported by
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Authority
> > and
> > http://www.vitta.org.au  - VITTA Victorian Information Technology
Teachers
> > Association Inc
> >
>
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