Home Page for UW's Computer Science Principles Development

CSE190S Computer Science Principles is a new course, developed as part of the AP Computer Science Principles project. This site hosts all public information concerning the development of the course at the University of Washington.

If you are looking for the course Web site for CSE190S,  <-- click there.

Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
-- Terry Pratchett

Computer Science Principles is a one quarter course offered by the University of Washington's Department of Computer Science and Engineering. The curriculum, which is entirely new, derives from the Seven Big Ideas and Seven Practices of Computational Thinking developed by the AP Computer Science Principles project. The course will be piloted in Winter Quarter 2011.

This document, which reports the results of the development effort, is organized as a series of topics. Most of the information is uncontroversial and requires no particular justification beyond the obvious point that the course developers needed to make choices, and others might make a different choice. In some cases the decision was less "determined," so a Rationale Section is included at the end and linked by item in the text.

Basic Data

• Course Number [provisional]: CSE190S
• Course Title: Computer Science Principles ^WHY
• Offering [pilot]: Winter, 2011
• Lectures [50 minutes]: Monday, Wednesday, Friday
• Labs [closed, 50 minutes]: Tuesday, Thursday
• Credit Hours: 5
• Fulfills Requirements: Quantitative and Symbolic Reasoning
• Prerequistes: None
• Description: Fundamentals of computer science essential for educated people living in the 21st C, taught with two concurrent themes. Creativity Theme topics: Computing as a creative activity, processing of data creates knowledge, abstraction, levels of abstraction, managing complexity, , computational thinking, programming (in Processing, Python languages) debugging. Principles Theme topics: Data and information, algorithms, basic ideas behind technologies including computers, networks, search engines, and multimedia. Social uses and abuses of information, and the foundations of privacy.
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•  Announcements  Web page and Orientation handout.

• Larry Snyder, Professor Emeritus of Computer Science and Engineering is a member of the Advisory Committee of the AP CS Principles project. He is the developer of the Fluency with Information Technlogy curriculum, and author of a widely used Fluency textbook.
• Hélène Martin, Computer Science Teacher, Garfield High School, Seattle and an avid blogger on educational topics, especially this course. She will teach Computer Science Principles at Garfield as part of the first round of pilot offereings in high schools during academic year 2011/2012.

Under construction

The "why" of certain choices made in the development of the Computer Science Principles course are explained. All items are linked from the preceding text.

Choosing the course title is, of course, the option of each of the five piloting schools. Instructors have been imaginative, and selected less routine titles than our Computer Science Principles.

• UC Berkeley : The Beauty and Joy of Computing
• UC San Diego : Fluency with Information Technology [mandated]
• Metropolitan College of Denver : Living in a Computating World
• UNC at Charlotte : The Magic of Computing