AP CSA Course Checklist

hi everyone I'm charell wage I teach at sou Falls Lincoln High School in sou Fall South Dakota and this is year 27 for me in Lincoln year 34 across the board and I teach I always call it a buffet of computer science classes because I have several different ones from computer science the AP Computer Science principles CSA programming one video game design exploring computer science Graphics sports broadcasting and I'm teaching forensics in the science department as well so I have a lot of classes so that's my Buffet and we're going to be talking about apcsa today that is a lot of prepping to do I am absolutely flabbergasted hats off to you yeah it's it's a lot great well if you will go to the next slide I will introduce our agenda and get everybody this link so today we are going to first start with a little bit about Cod JS and then we we will talk apcsa course pacing and also how to submit your course audit we will learn about some resources that are available to you on the codehs platform and do a little dive into the exam and how to prepare your students we would love to have your questions today Shel if you'll go to the next slide we can answer those questions here in the chat or in the Q&A your choice please drop those in and we will respond to those as we are able so very happy to interact with you today via the chat or the Q&A so please let us know how we can help and what questions you might have and if you'll go to the next slide charell please we do want to make sure that everybody has a Cod HS account already if you don't have a Cod HS account please sign up for one they are free and it gets you access to an amazing library of middle school and high school computer science curriculum so well worth taking time to sign up for an account so take a moment to do that or take a moment to sign in if you already have an account and then charell if you'll go one more slide for me we do want to give you a certificate for your attendance here today so once you have created your Cod HS account or once you have signed in to your Cod HS account go ahead and click the link that Robin has dropped in the chat there for your attendance and we will ensure that you get your certificate of completion emailed out all right so charell if you want to go one more slide and I will pass it off to you all right great all right so the apcsa checklist kind of going through and going through a timeline and just some dates that you would want to have written down so you're familiar with what you need to have your students do for the exam registration and that deadline is November 15th of 2024 they do run their deadlines some of them in eastern time and some of them in local time so you'll want to pay close attention to what the time is for the deadlines one good thing and I do this at the beginning of the year before school starts but your AP Coordinator would do that as well but you want to have all of your students join AP classroom AP classroom has all of the information for students about exam it has examples it has teacher resources for you and it also has a lot of questions exam questions and prep questions and progress questions and daily videos that you can incorporate into your classes and Link students too so they can have an extra outside review for that for the AP exam the registration date is October 4th 4 2024 I believe this changes depending on which semester you are offering the AP Computer Science class so like for example for me my registration date will be the February one because my or maybe it is the October one my AP coordinator hasn't told me but usually the AP principles is one date and the ACA apcsa is another date course audit the deadline for that the course audit what that is is AP college board requires the apcs teachers to submit a syllabus of what you are covering in your class so it can be approved by the college board that you are using an approved curriculum to teach the AP CSA content and that is all out on the AP college board site I do have the January 31st date on there highlighted that's going to take you out to the website that looks like this and it's going to have me log in again sorry about that I don't know why it logged me out I just logged in but secure site I guess this is taking you to the changes that are going to be for the 25 26 school year so the apcsa test is going to change not this year but for the 25 26 school year and code HS is creating their updates for that class as well and so you can still use code HS and go through that course they're going to update their course as well so it'll all be launching that 2526 school year all right let me go back to the slides here the apcsa exam this year is on May 7th 2025 at noon your local time and one thing this year is it's digital so it's not going to be paper pencil for this exam and I'm not quite sure how the free response is going to run I've sent questions on that and I've asked my AP coordinator how they were going to do the free response question in apcsa since you have to write code so that one's kind of on hold for me as well the link at the bottom of the page takes you to a timeline that is in AP Central it has all of those dates that I had on the slide when the registration is how to create your class section and codes and how to use the AP classroom sources and then it's even listed by Seasons you know in the fall there's some AP workshops and then when you get try to do a test review with that new online software that's called Blue Book they're going to send out some information on that and then it tells you what's coming up there's the October 1st deadline for the AP audit so when that change comes for 2526 we're all going to have to do a new course audit for that all right Cod HS and AP Computer Science a Cod HS offers two different curriculums there's a Nitro and a mocha and what this is is a an overview and their curriculum shows its 130 contact hours for the year there are two links that you're going to find on this page one will take you to the Nitro overview that's in code HS and you can when you get into code HS the AP Computer Science a Nitro is college board approved and so is is the other one you can VI view the syllabus here or explore the course and so I'm going to click on explore course and it's going to take you through and it breaks it down by lessons and covers everything that you need for the AP Computer Science exam all along here charell kind of related to that we have a question in the Q&A it says teaching CSA for the first time I have been reading that some teachers prefer to teach units three and four before a mix of five and two together afterwards would you recommend this I personally I always do classes at the end I do class files after I do if and else and iteration I've tried it both ways and my students liked it better with class files after they knew how to do arrays and if statements is that answering your question yeah that question was from Teresa so Teresa if you have a follow-up question definitely put it in the chat or in the Q&A thank you did that answer her question okay I will slide back here that was the Nitro and so then the course syllabus for apcsa is the second link and you can print that off and it shows all of the goals and objectives and then it tells you all of the topics that are covered and it goes right along with code HS and AP so what classes need to be covered what topics need to be covered the if statements and it's very well put together the weeks and the hours are an estimate sometimes it depends on the students I've had where it will take a little bit longer and they get through the if statements okay they get through the loops okay when we start getting into writing classes though that's where it slows down a little bit and then especially in the upper topics when it gets down to searching and array lists then it starts to slow down and sometimes I need to take a little bit more time with the students all right the next one this is back at Nitro and this slide is showing you all of the units and how long or an estimate of how long it would take to cover each unit and I work in between I kind of squeeze in between test practices free response and test questions as I go through all of the units so it gives them an idea because AP classroom has those focused questions and so does Cod HS where you can just stick to the topic that you're on so they get used to what those questions look like before they get all mixed in when they're taking the test and again here is the recommended pacing from Cod HS and what to do for those sections the writing like I said writing classes inheritance and object I kind of push those down a little further and I cover Boolean if statements iteration and a little bit of arrays and then I go back to using objects and methods because the students then know what those units are and they're familiar with writing a program and they're not trying to do two difficult things at the same time and I tried like I said earlier I tried it one way and the students struggled and so then I went back and they preferred they preferred that charell could you clarify when it says two weeks or three weeks are you seeing your students every day for 45 minutes 60 Minutes how how often do you see your students I see my students every day for 50 minutes so we're not yeah the good question because we're not on a block schedule so mine is a 50in class period Monday through Friday and here is another recommended pacing and it's just another example from cods for pacing the Primitive then Boolean and iteration and this is the one that I do first and when you want to raise I do the arrays Al together I don't do arrays and then array list and then 2D arrays scattered throughout it's best to do all of the arrays at the same time I believe next that 2526 they're taking inheritance out and that was a link that I gave you before I kind of wish they would take recursion out that's my opinion okay so I'm just kind of going through these recommendations to give you some ideas and then at the end you can do the apcsa review in COD HS but as I said I always go to AP classroom as well and I squeeze in some of their questions they are topic based so you can enter in the topic on AP classroom and get several questions where you can narrow them down based on the unit and the topics covered so it works really well to mesh the AP classroom and codehs together they've done a good job building that in to work with that all right charel sorry I'm gonna interrupt you one more time we had a question clarifying the sequence of the units again let's see oops I went forward can I go back here it's probably not going to let me there we go be able to use the arrows on your keyboard oh there we go it didn't work earlier so I was trying to go back which sequence that I use or yeah what Anna Maria wants to hear the sequence of units that you do okay yeah I start with the Primitive types I do slide 12 on the slideshow I will do the Primitive types and then I go right into Boolean and iteration and then arrays one-dimensional arrays two-dimensional arrays and then I'll go back and go to objects classes inheritance and recursion my students have like I said before they just feel more comfortable knowing the actual code and that's what we cover in programming one it's kind of it's apcsa but I call it programming one that first semester and then the AP is all about objects and methods so I go I kind of mix up code HS and I do the Nitro one I kind of mix up my lessons a little bit with that because I also incorporate apcs the AP classroom into these as well and one other good thing and that is listed you have to do some labs and we'll get to that as we get further on in the slides I don't want to confuse anybody with jumping around that way so this is my my coverage right here I went backwards again there we go so that's the slide that I do first and then again you know chunking the arrays once you hit the array array list and 2D arrays the array list you almost have to have objects and classes so I do wait on this one because the traversing of a arrays the Sorting the binary sort the linear sort that all goes with your objects and classes so that meshes well together when I do arrays I always say recursion for the end that seems once they know all of the the top down and how to read the programs and the logic behind it some kids will get recursion some won't but I always save that for the last part that's the I feel that's the most difficult part because of the merge sort the binary search the selection sort involved with that and sometimes it takes me more than a week but up here I have not I don't use like three weeks for Boolean Expressions so my timing I'm still on track to leave a good two and a halfish weeks at the end that we have just solid review good questions all right to get your AP courses in the codehs this is going to bring up the syllabus again that shows the breakdown of the classes and their topics covered you'll notice that it says review Labs consumer review Labs it will say some Labs as we go through this Magpie lab these are Labs that the College Board has set and the students need to know the content not specifically what the magpie lab was about they just need to know how it works and How It Was Written and that gets confusing sometimes because they'll they'll memorize okay this picture that picture this code that code but what they need to know is how it works for the labs and the labs I work them in AP classroom says or AP college board says that you need to give 15 to 20 hours of having them work on those labs but I work them in to the section that they're in so when I follow my syllabus here when it says to do a specific lab I will do that Lab at that time as long as it doesn't have like the consumer review lab doesn't have like class files or anything like that so it'll fit in there once I cover class files then I'll go in and do the labs that have those so I don't sit down and do all of the labs in those 20 hours they're meshed in I think that's beneficial for the students to mesh those in not as confusing for them all right pH HS offers here's the difference between the Nitro and the mocha Nitro and the mocha curriculum both of them will prepare your students for the apcsa exam the mocha one teaches objects later and I suppose I use the nitro material but I do teach the objects later they both align to the framework the Nitro however in AP classroom in I my apologies in AP classroom there are progress checks that are really good for students and for you as the instructor to see where the kids are at so I give those progress checks and they're found in AP classroom to the students after once they start going through their programming and they're really good it shows what they can do what they can't do and what the what they're comfortable with Nitro has the main method the scanner class and that's what is on most of the AP exams if they have anything with taking in input usually they don't worry about the scanner class or anything like that on the test and so here's your syllabus for mocha and your syllabus for Nitro so I'll pull from one or the other when I go through it so I would suggest that you take a look at both curriculums and see which one would be beneficial for your students because both of these prepare for the exam and here are the college Labs College Board Labs that I was talking about there is a code HS apcsa lab course that you can look up the link is on the slide and notice this is 15 hours of time and the college board says you need at least 20 hours of work on those labs but here are this is really good for the preview it tells you the consumer review is this portion and then you've got Magpie lab the pict lab 11s those are all found on the College Board site as well they're from the College Board Battleship Pokemon Blackjack and mad libs are on COD HS those are from what Cod HS has written so a good section of review for the programs and this is50 hours if you wanted to sit down and do all of those labs this is that mini course that would get you through those labs and so here is the requirements for those if you're making your checklist for timing you want to make sure that you give them that 15 contact hours or a minimum of 20 hours in class to work on those programs they need to know that content and how the programs and the class files work and inheritance and objectoriented Concepts both mocha and Nitro will fulfill that lab experience for them and the AP exam these labs are important to incorporate in I'm not sure what that is ah they wanted to restart my system to incorporate into your classes to help prepare so I start early with simple questions from each unit and topic as I'm going through and preparing them and then I don't start the labs until where Cod says to start the labs that's when I will put the labs in and here are the labs sensitive all the ones with the asterisks you will find steganography is a new one that's out on the College Board site picture lab Magpie and 11s these are all out on the College Board site you can download the files and the student files from the College Board site AP Central the Mad Libs Battleship Pokemon and blackjack are found in COD HS the other ones are in code HS as well but I was just referring to the other ones you can find them on the College Board site also all right we're going to take you back to submitting your course audit and what this course audit is when you are searching for your curriculum I stated this earlier this is one thing that's required by the College Board you need to have a course syllabus and submit it through the AP college board and code HS is an endorsed provider so if you write down that you are using Code HS mocha or Nitro that syllabus that they have you can upload that with the your application and you shouldn't have any problem you don't have to put on there if you're going to make like additional programs or changes they're more they're more or less looking for the topics and the unit and the content that's being covered so you don't have to put your assignments there you're just putting a syllabus and so when I put this in I did the code HS Nitro and everything went fine so submitting your course audit if you're new to CSA or you've never done a course audit you have to submit the course audit form and that's found on codehs.com there is a course audit form if you're using when you're using Code HS if you're using a previously authorized course your administrator will renew every year for you that you're running that AP class so you don't have to submit an audit every year it's when you change career curriculum or the AP college board changes the exam information so that is why I mentioned earlier that we have to pay close attention to dates this year because the 25 26 school year the AP CSA exam curriculum is changing so we'll all have to do that audit so what learning resources help us throughout the school year what does code HS have for us Cod HS is awesome and it has all kinds of information for us and you will find that at the resource Hub here on phod hs.com that link will take you you right to here and so what I really like here's that AP CSA they have a textbook that you can use if you don't have a textbook or you don't use one this is an electronic form that goes along with Cod HS I love love love the code the questions of the day I sign those as openers or what they might call Bell ringers and so the students know they come in do the question of the day and they also have frq Resource Center so if you are running into some problems with the frq's you can go ahead and go into this the review is great I do this at the end the AP Computer Science a review you can add that to your list of courses and then of course they have some practice in Java and here are all of the labs that I was talking about that you can find them on COD H or Cod HS and AP Central and then they've got additional projects looks like there's some new ones in there for you and the guides there to get you going and to get you started so if you are new to apcsa I highly recommend going to this resource Hub to get your students in this review the textbook and the question of the day whether you're using mocha or Nitro they're going to be these are going to help you on both of those I guess I kind of covered the question of the day already here's what the question of the day looks like and we don't know what they're going to be so I usually do this the second semester because then students they're familiar with classes and they know what what's what and what's happening there's just multiple choice and it's only one this is an example of the frq center that was one of the links that was on that page that I showed you and here are the areas you can assign them to your class oh I'm sorry the mouse is so touchy you can assign them to your class you can take a look at it so you can use these on whatever it is that you want however you want to incorporate these into your classes one good thing about codehs also is they offer the practice and whether it's another program they have a Sandbox and so the students can go in and practice write their own if you're not using a specific software for your curriculum for them to code in so you can always the code HS s box is there programs are autog graded sometimes with the autograde you have to be careful and I tell my students this all the time because they'll say but I have this right it came out with the right answer but it still marked it wrong sometimes it just depends on if you had a syntax error in it the tab wasn't pushed in it may count that so just double check with on the the auto grading this is the interactive textbook that was one of those first links on that resource Hub that we that I showed you and this textbook has all of the chapters in it that goes along with the code HS curriculum and I use that when I when I go through because I don't have a textbook well I do we use it for resource a reference but I don't like assign the chapters out of the book the kids sometimes the way it's worded isn't well so I like this one and it's interactive for them as well charell I'm gonna give you a little time call here and so if you pick either AP exam overview or preparing students for the exam whatever would think is more important for the group to hear about and then we'll wrap up okay I'll kind of combine those two the apcsa exam I do give this to my students I let them know how much time they have and how many questions and 50% of the score as we go through I add this you might want to add this to your checklist as well to have them show them a fully answered free response and so they can see how it's scored and that's all out on AP classroom this is important for your checklist the biggest part of the AP exam iteration Boolean if statements inheritance is 5 to 10% so these percentages will give you an idea of what the topics are and how much it's going to show up on the test so definitely Boolean iteration classes I'm going to bypass this one that's section two this is an overview of what a free response question looks like and they have these in codehs and AP classroom for you to look at one thing you want to let your students know all of these that they're given a no penalty for the syntax so because some students are saying well I forgot a semicolon when I was answering my question they're not going to get deducted app point for that so you'll want to have them look at what they're going to get deducted app point for and so if they miss a semicolon if they spell a word wrong they're not looking for for syntax errors they're looking for whether they got the content if it was supposed to be a for Loop there and they put a for Loop there that point should be there all right preparing AP review on COD HS and AP classroom I can't you know push that enough practice practice practice for the kiddos for the exam questions throughout and the progress on AP classroom this is the review so I've kind of covered in that review these are in code HS they can choose their programs it depends on how you want to grade them what you want to do skimming through really quick I'm sorry I ran out of time here's the key dates you want to keep these in mind add these to your checklist for the AP exam the course audit deadline is every January 31st about when you can finish the Cod HS course and that will take you to the exam and if you are interested in learning more about codehs please V us visit us at codehs.com learn more and thank you all so much for your time thank you charell thank you Robin for your assistance and we wish you all a wonderful evening thank you thank you [Music]