Summer Coding 2016

Welcome to Summer Coding 2016!

Notes for each meeting, including suggested work for the next session, are linked from the table below. The meeting times are all 6:30pm - 8:30pm

A group of 10-15 GWC students are meeting over the summer to learn some computer science with each other and with David. We'll meet at the Newton Library 9 times over the summer. Though not every girl will be able to attend every meeting, it looks like most everyone is able to attend at least 6 sessions. The summer will be largely self-paced, so it won’t be too problematic if you miss some sessions -- come when you can. Please do plan on spending 2-4 hours between sessions watching videos, reading, and doing some coding.

Our first meeting is Thursday, June 16, 6:30pm - 8:30pm, at the Newton Free Library. I know not everyone can make it -- don’t worry. The full list of meeting dates is listed below.

We’ll be using the materials from Harvard's CS50x course, offered freely through EdX. CS50x is a college level introductory course, intended for students with no prior experience in coding or Computer Science whatsoever. It's meaty stuff, but I'm sure that you can tackle at least the start of the course. We won't come close to getting through it all during the summer, but we'll learn some good stuff and maybe continue on into the school year as well, who knows?

We’ll operate as a flipped classroom. Before each session, I’ll ask you to watch an online lecture video on your own during the week. Then we'll get together as a group to resolve questions about the material, and start to tackle the coding exercises ("problem sets"). You may code individually or in partnership with another girl. You can then continue to work on the problem sets at home during the week and submit them to me for feedback when they finished. This approach is called a "flipped classroom" -- you do the problem sets in class, and the lecture work at home. I’ll explain this approach again and answer any questions about it during our first meeting.

Update: Summer is over! We worked through Weeks 1 and 2 of the CS50x. Here's a page of reference solutions to Problem Set 1 and Problem Set 2.