Learning Problem Statements v 1.0
“In preparation for the expert interview, write at least three short posts, each one identifying one “learning problem” you might want to solve in about one paragraph. Include: WHO needs to learn WHAT and WHY it is important. For each, name three people who could help you learn more about this challenge. Post each “problem” here as a post on this discussion (not on a google doc as I showed in seminar).”
Bruno is going to teach a course on iOS development at a training center. He is a skilled programmer but has never taught before. The center has general guidelines as to what topics he must cover over the course of the next 8 weeks. There is no course material (slides, videos or written material) to support his lessons. He has no idea where to start or how to structure his lessons. He needs to learn some basic strategies, techniques and teaching methods to be able to start preparing his lesson plan and teaching materials.
Three people who could help learn more about this challenge:
- Sarah Wischnia – professor – Introduction to Teaching
- Paul Hegarty – professor – iOS Development
- Denise Pope – professor – Curriculum Construction
Alex is a motivated young developer who is fascinated with the new AppleTV OS that recently came out. He learned how to create apps for it and it was quite tricky, even though he has experience with iOS Apps already. He understands this is valuable content he’s acquired and knows that he can make some money out of this (and he needs it). He now has to decide which platform(s) to use to distribute his content. To address this challenge he needs to find out what are the available platforms out there, their market share, revenue sharing business models as well as usability, feature sets and appear. In order to do so he must research the topic online, talk to other users and subject matter expert for some guidelines and pointers.
Three people who could help learn more about this challenge:
- Karin Forssell – subject matter expert – LDT
- John Mitchell – subject matter expert – Vice Provost for Online Learning
- Soren Rosier – subject matter expert – former SRI researcher
Luciana is the manager of a software development center which teaches mobile development to software engineers as well as complete programming novices. She needs to insure that the novices are actually learning the basics in the introductory courses before she can move them on to the regular courses intended for those who already know how to code. In the regular classes the novices have a hard time keeping up with the pace. This results in them either giving up on the course, retaking the course, hindering the progress of the class and/or feeling the school has not taught him properly. She needs to be able to assess the novice’s progress early on in this 2 week long course to be able to talk to the teacher to pay more attention to that student or schedule extra help sessions. She also needs to assess students who claim they are at a sufficient level to take the course. In order to so, Luciana needs to learn about assessment methods commonly used in programming courses, how to implement and track them effectively.
Three people who could help learn more about this challenge:
- Dan Schwartz – subject matter expert – Dean – Graduate School of Education
- Jean-Paul Schmetz – Chief Scientist – https://codility.com – Software Developer testing platform
-
Nate Hardison – Professor Computer Science