1 / 11

CCSC-E 2011, Oct. 15, 2011 Marymount University Sen Zhang and James Ryder

Using and Creating Automatically Generated PowerPoint Slides to Facilitate Teaching of Data Structures and Algorithms. CCSC-E 2011, Oct. 15, 2011 Marymount University Sen Zhang and James Ryder Department of Mathematics, Computer Science and Statistics SUNY Oneonta. Abstract.

krista
Download Presentation

CCSC-E 2011, Oct. 15, 2011 Marymount University Sen Zhang and James Ryder

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Using and Creating Automatically Generated PowerPoint Slides to Facilitate Teaching of Data Structures and Algorithms CCSC-E 2011, Oct. 15, 2011 Marymount University Sen Zhang and James Ryder Department of Mathematics, Computer Science and Statistics SUNY Oneonta

  2. Abstract We present an on-going, long term, coding intensive project that aims to facilitate teaching of Data Structures and Algorithms (DSA) using automatically generated PowerPoint slides. CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  3. About the Project (What?) • The project is about prototyping a web-based system to automatically generate and supply slides for teaching DSA that are most frequently taught in undergraduate computer science curricula, in the Microsoft PowerPoint (MSPPT) format. • Auto-generated MSPPT slides promote • preparedness, standardization, centralization, reuse of teaching materials and experiences • The project aims to • Increase accessibility of practical, lightweight, standardized, customizable, easy-to-adopt, teaching-oriented presentation materials for DSA • facilitate, enhance, modernize the current practice of algorithm teaching CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  4. Significance and Motivation (Why?) • DSA are a core part of computer science curriculum • DSA are easy for instructors to summarize or recite at the conceptual level but DSA can be difficult for first time students to fully understand especially when no effective visualization aids are used • Instructors and students can use MSPPT with almost zero learning curve but there is no access to effective MSPPT-based teaching slides for DSA mainly due to the following major obstacles • Illustration of any non-trivial algorithm involves step by step demonstration. This demands accurate calculations and/or scaled drawings to be made repetitively and/or recursively. Therefore, high quality algorithm drawings are tedious and time-consuming to create. • Hand made slides tend to be error-prone. • Occasionally, different datasets or wrong intermediate steps may cause the need to overhaul the presentation from scratch. • … • Our auto-generation approach has potential to overcome these obstacles. CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  5. MSPPT Based Solution PowerPoint is a ubiquitous office tool for presentation Microsoft has built in API that allow dynamic creation of PowerPoint presentations from with programming languages CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  6. What has been done so far? On-going, long term and labor intensive We have implemented about 12 generators for different DSA We have prototyped a web based system that can automatically run these generators We have sample slides on our web site now with about 2000 hits in past 18 months Currently most of programming effort done by faculty and student volunteers CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  7. What will be done? We will continue to refine the materials (code slides, web pages, etc.) We will grow project by creating more generators for more DSA CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  8. Uniqueness It will not replace other approaches (graphical runtime algorithm animations) but create a good balance Provides a unique instructor friendly alternative to previous graphical approaches to teaching DSA This is not a student-computer interactive approach but is a student-teacher interactive approach CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  9. Pedagogical Advantages Standardization Automation Preparedness Focus on explanation rather than visualization Reuse Materials Centralization CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  10. 3 Ways to Use the Slides Effortless Adoption Download the sample MSPPT slides generated by our project http://employees.oneonta.edu/zhangs/PowerPointPlatform/ Refine the slides Take a slide package and alter it at your discretion CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

  11. 3 Ways to Use the Slides Generate new slides using your own inputs You can supply the input for the DSA that you would like to teach and a set of slide will automatically be generated for you Depending on the generator desired, the input may be text, numeric, or an XML file CCSC-E 2011 Marymount University

More Related