Scala First Lessons from 3 student generations
summary
Three years of running Scala as the first course for 130 students per year with 15 teaching assistants yields a more even grade distribution and higher pass rates in the subsequent Java course: top-first-course students now reliably pass the second course and beginners (one third with no prior code) catch up. Workflow uses Kojo, sbt, a tiny ScalaLab GUI and IDEs (Atom/Metals, IntelliJ bundle); labs like block mole and Game of Life are continuously assessed and must be approved before the final.
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chapters (17)
- 0:00Intro
- 2:31Acknowledgements
- 3:42Scala first lessons
- 6:11History of first languages at Lund University
- 8:23The Java first situation (2015)
- 11:28Scala first-a big success!
- 12:23How to teach programming with Scala?
- 13:02Pedadogical ideas behind course design
- 14:45A typical study week
- 15:39How did we design contents & progression?
- 19:44How did we deal with a very broad spectrum of pre-knowledge?
- 21:40The first three weeks are playful
- 24:26Continuous assessment: Lab sessions
- 30:15Experiences with Scala first-Challenges
- 32:59Key ingredients in our progression for Scala first
- 35:36The future of Scala at Lund University
- 37:29Scal: A better deal for beginner programmers?
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