Intro to Computer Science Grades 9 to 10
Intro to Computer Science Grades 9 to 10 is a 12-week introductory computer science course for high schoolers. Students build Beacon, a paper prototype of an app that watches the plants in the crew's Moon greenhouse and relays readings to mission control. They plan it with users in mind, write it in pseudocode with variables, conditionals, loops, lists and procedures, compare search algorithms, and test and debug it. Then they encode data in binary, compress and clean it, send messages as packets through a paper network, and finish with a launch review on security, privacy and fairness. It covers the five big ideas of AP Computer Science Principles and practices CSTA Level 3A standards; it is not an AP course and is not affiliated with College Board. Short daily lessons with checked answers, an unplugged Beacon Lab each week and a Saturday Mission Quest for the family. No accounts, apps or software needed. 100% free, start to finish.
- Plan a program from users' needs with requirements and a storyboard
- Write and trace pseudocode with variables, conditionals, loops, lists and procedures
- Compare linear and binary search and reason about algorithm efficiency
- Test with edge cases, find and fix errors, and document code for others
- Represent data in binary, compress it and draw honest conclusions from it
- Explain how the internet routes packets and weigh security, privacy and bias in computing
What's inside
- Week 1 Design Before Code
- Week 2 Algorithms in Pseudocode
- Week 3 Making Decisions
- Week 4 Loops
- Week 5 Lists
- Week 6 Procedures and Abstraction
- Week 7 Search, Speed and Limits
- Week 8 Test, Debug, Document
- Week 9 Bits and Binary
- Week 10 Data, Compression and Models
- Week 11 Systems and the Internet
- Week 12 Safe, Fair and Ready: Beacon Launch Review