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2025-10-24

  • Day 2
  • Author: Richel

I think we do not do object-oriented programming, yet I heard it both today and yesterday. Checking the meeting notes, I see no decision on this. On the other hand, I do not have time for doing OOP in my sessions. I suggest to reduce the mentioning of OOP.

For the rest of the day, in my part, I tried out breakout rooms of 1 person. I felt uncomfortable doing so, as I worried the learners would feel alone. But after some visits, the learners seemed to be fine with it. There was plenty of opportunity to have a bit longer talks with learners.

During the day, I never rushed, even though there was more on the schedule, which felt the right choice.

[Edit from the future] I feel the session about issues and kanban board was given too early: it should be discussed after using them when working as a team

  • [ ] Schedule issues and kanban board after working as a team

Day 2

Retrospect

What helped us learn (let us move forward)

  • A: Interaction during explanations
  • A: Better instructions for exercises compared to yesterday
  • A: The practical exercises were really great !
  • A: Richel's enthusiasm :-)
  • A: Individual feedback for exercises
  • A: nice explanations and instructions for the tutorials, easy to follow, always there for questions
  • A: The exercises were helpful! Practising it and getting feedback is good!
  • A: The live examples. It was helpful to get an explanation of the structure of the lesson before starting. Having a chance to ask questions in the individual breaking room.

What stopped us from learning (What held us back)

  • A: Sometimes the assignements are unclear

I wish I knew which ones. I commonly ask if my exercises are clear and I always get a 'yes'. Sure, I expect a bias for 'yes', yet I have nothing to go on to suspect it would be my assignments.

  • A: No live examples for TDD, I would have appreciated at least one live demonstration of the methods before the exercises, and not just discussing it theoretically - it is a bit counterintuitive.

I can imagine. I wondered about that too. I've added it to the course material that strongly reminds me to do so.

  • A: Too little knowledge in python to be able to feel confident in writing tests correctly - are you sure the initial requirements for the course are really enough?

I can imagine one feels like this. I am confident he/she can do this (sure, that does not take away his/her self-doubt). I have seen R programmers being able to do this. I do supply all the needed Python code that needs to be used, so I feel: yes, this is doable. I hope I can get a 1-on-1 about this with him/her. Additionally, we will do pair programming next day: this may help him/her regain her confidence and/or motivation. I will couple him/her with someone that is patient and confident in Python.

  • A: rather similar examples, not really sure how this expand (especially TDD) to more complex settings, How easy is it to find tests then?

My bad: the goal was to drill TDD, with simple examples (i.e. no focus on complex code at all). I've added a question box to each exercise, forcing me to write down why each exercise seems repetitive. Due to this, I removed one out of 5 exercises. Thanks!

  • A: I got issues with git in VS code but that probably comes down to my inexperience.

I've seen him/her struggle. We teachers picked VSCode to reduce this struggle, so it is painful to see how it still fails. I agree with him/her, that this will fix itself with some more experience, together with some patient help from us teachers. I will couple him/her with someone that has shown his/her confidence with the VSCode IDE :-)

What could we do to improve learning (What can we invent)

  • A: Better defined assignements ?

Agreed!

  • A: Give at least one live example of TDD before letting the students tackle the challenge by themselves. Or maybe suggest to watch one of the videos first?

Done!

  • A: Maybe a bit more hands-on exercise is good. Something a little complex.

Added an extra and more free exercise with this.

  • A: Also, how to relate these good practices in our programming for our disciplines, for example assert and stuff won't work for simulations and other programming.

This is a misconception I should deal with next day: everything I taught works for all code.

  • A: Do the first TDD example as a team and not individually - one good example would save from waisting time on pracitising the wrong method

Done!

  • A: Showcasing an exemplary more complex example

Added!

  • A: A way to communicate with the teacher when inside breakout rooms!

I agree that this sometimes can feel clumsy. I have no way to fix this. As far as I know, some Zoom setups have a button to ask for help, but I do not if we have it. As I schedule a visit every 5 minutes, I hope that is not too much of a problem, but I agree that this is clumsy :-/

  • A: 3 minutes for the retrospective questions is too long, we always end up answering the next questions during the first one :). maybe 2min? 2:30?

I assume Lars reads this. Taking a peek down: yes he does :-)

  • A:A bit more use case discussion on issues - like a how does it look like for a sample/real life project

Done!

What will we do(Act) [Teachers only]

  • Lars clearify excersises

This is on Lars :-)

  • Time management, make morning session more hands on less theory

This is on Lars :-)

  • Change from twice a year to only spring. to allow for more prep time for teachers.

For me, the frequency is fine.

  • Define clear roles before.

Unsure what this applies to ...?

My action points for next lesson:

  • [ ] Go through this reflection with the learners
  • [x] Make pairs that will help get the less confident learnes thrive

Taking a look at the learning outcomes below, we see that the harder topics resulted in the lower confidences:

Learning outcome Average confidence
I can use TDD to develop functions 2.8
I understand why TDD is important 3.8
I can use a kanban board 4
I understand why assert is important 4.2
I can create assign and close an issue 4.4
I understand why a kanban board is important 4.6
I understand why issues are important 4.8
How does that look as a plot?

Average confidences for my learning outcomes

On Monday, I will need to show how TDD scales up to a harder setting. I have done so with 'Dream development'. I see that this session uses objects, so I will write something from fresh, applied to the weather project.