Mr. John Meinzen

• Explain Exam intent & use :

  • students receive an AP CSA score between 1 and 5.

  • A score of 3 (or higher) means that the student--according to College Board--is qualified to receive college credit for AP CSA.

  • Each school determines specific course and score that they will "accept".

• Know the Exam Components :

  • 90 minutes multiple choice (50% of AP score)

  • 90 minutes free response (50% of AP score)

• Know the Scoring Process : become an AP CSA Reader!

• Know the new teacher and student supports available on August 2019

• AP Classroom [available August 1, 2019]
  [similar to many Content or Course Management Systems like Moodle, Blackboard, Schoology, etc.]

  • Question Bank for teachers to optionally assign problems to students.

  • Personal Progress Checks for Student and Teacher. Teachers may assign or create assessments for students.

  • Progress Dashboard for Teachers to identify student/classroom skill competencies.

• Fall Registration [available August 1, 2019]:

  Online registration of students for AP Classroom resources & registering (ordering) for spring AP Exams.

  • October 15 : preferred deadline for online registration, $94/exam

  • November 15 : final deadline for online registration without late fee, $94/exam

  • November 16 - March 13 : $94/exam + $40 late fee [Exception: no late fee for 2nd semester-only courses]

  • March 13 : final order changes [$40 late fee for 2nd semester-only courses after this date ]

  • $40 fee for unused exams

   

  Official Flyers for generating and using classroom "join codes" [printout and hand to your students or teachers]:

  • Student Account tips

  • Teacher Account tips

  • AP Coordinator (administrator) setup, enrollment, and ordering

• For experienced AP CSA teachers with an already approved syllabus, there is no need to submit a NEW syllabus for 2019-20

• Audit Process (allows teacher acess to Secure Documents as well as AP Classroom:

• For 2019 - 2020

  • For existing teachers of AP CSA - simple renewal by administrator (AP Coordinator)

    • For teachers in AP World History, Art & Design, Drawing, Biology, Human Geo, EnvSci, Eng Lang, Compar GOPO, or Italian - complete a Course Authorization form and "attestation" to the updated curricular requirements

  • For new teachers of AP CSA - here are the "simplified" steps:

    1. login to apcentral.collegeboard.org,

    2. find & start the audit form,

    3. download & accept the new CED as your syllabus

    4. your AP coordinator (administrator) can now finish the Audit Form and "approve" you as the course teacher.

    • For teachers of AP CSP, Research, Seminar - complete a Course Audit form and submit a syllabus

• For 2020 - 2021

  • For existing teachers of AP CSA - simple renewal by administrator (AP Coordinator)

    • For teachers of AP World History - approved Course Authorization form transferred and or submit syllabus for review.

    • For teachers of AP Art & Design, Drawing, Biology, Human Geo, EnvSci, Eng Lang, Compar GOPO, or Italian - approved Course Authorization form transferred or submit a new syllabus based on updated curricular requirements.

  • For new teachers of AP CSA - already approved Course Authorization form can be transferred or submit a new syllabus based on updated curricular requirements

    • For teachers of AP CSP, Research, Seminar - complete a Course Audit form and submit a syllabus

• Course Approval means the teacher has submitted an approved Syllabus as part of the Audit Form so schools may use "AP" on student transcripts. New CED can be submitted (attested) as new teacher Syllabus!

• AP Teacher Community is a ListServer for teachers to ask questions, share insights, and receive official answers from the College Board. Requires Educator Professional Login (EPL) at apcentral.collegeboard.org

• Understand Assessments - Formative vs Summative

• AP Exams are Summative Assessements of Student Learning -- AP Exams are not designed to be used for students to "learn from" (i.e. not future-view)...only assess what students have already learned (i.e. historical-view only).

• AP Classroom are Formative Assessments & Practice for Student Learning - include new online resources [Question Bank, Personal Progess Checks, and Progress Dashboard]. Formative Assessments are designed as both future-view (students may learn from) and historical-view (assess what has/has not been learned). Formative assessments are not to be used as evaluation of teacher effectiveness.

• Understand how the Course and Exam Description can be a Design for Instruction...see page 162 for Instructional Strategies including :

  • Peer Programming

  • Code Tracing

  • Error Analysis

  • Think aloud (talking to the Rubber-Duck!]

  • etc.

Workshop Leader's Insights:

• for new AP CSA teachers, the Course & Exam Description (CED) is the "oracle" that will guide you when planning your course, preparing exams, and answer many of your questions when no one else is around to help. The new AP Classroom can provide much-needed classroom support for yourself and your students throughout the school year.

• for experienced AP CSA teachers, the new CED along with AP Classroom represents a major "upgrade" by the College Board toward its mission to "connect students to college success and opportunity." While the changes are significant, a successful AP teacher can maintain their current course and transition over time (several years?).

Participant Activity [Workshop Binder Treasure Hunt]

Detailed exploration of the Unit Guides in Groups to "Look for a Pattern"

1. Pick one Unit in the Workshop Binder for your Group to focus on.

2. Your group's objective is to sequentially complete the following 9 CheckPoints and find a "treasure" within the Unit to share.

CheckPoints:

1. What do the colors of the Practices represent?

   Answers

   1. Purple : Program Design and Development
   2. Blue : Code Logic
   3. Brown : Code Implementation
   4. Yellow : Code Testing
   5. Green : Documentation

2. What do the three letter abreviations above each colored box represent?

   Answers

   The 4 Big Ideas

   • MOD : Modularity
   • CON : Control
   • VAR : Variables
   • IOC : Impact of Computing

3. How many units are there for the entire course? Why do you think they are sequenced in this order?

   Answers

   10 Units

   Sequence determined by the College Board from feedback received from content experts, studies, & textbook examples at the collegiate level.

4. Under each Unit title, there is a number range (that is not %). What are the ranges for?

   Answers

   Estimated number of 45 minute class periods for the Unit.

5. Which two units have the most topics? Which two have the least?

   Answers

   Most : Unit 2 Using Objects has 9 topics. Unit 5 Writing Classes has 10 topics.

   Least : Unit 8 2D Array has 2 topics. Unit 10 Recursion has 2 topics.

6. What is the information at the bottom of the column telling you?

   Answers

   The estimated number of Multiple Choice (and Free Response) Questions available in each Unit.

   Teachers may assign none, some, or all from the Question Bank and use as Personal Progress Checks (available 1Aug2019).

7. Under each Unit title, there is a percentage(s). What do they represent?

   Answers

   Approximate weighting of each Unit on the AP Exam

8. What do you think is measured in the Personal Progress Checks (PPC)?

   Answers

   The skills and topics the students have learned.

   Free Response Questions measure Learning Objectives

   Multiple Choice Questions mesure Essential Knowledge Statements.

9. How is the scaffolding of skills displayed across the Units?

   Answers

   Practices are spiralled across units.

   Practices -> Skills are learned through repetition and scaffolded across increasingly complex content sequenced via 10 Units

   The 10 Units spiral the 4 Big Ideas via Topics

pre-2019 Course Description states...

• Three exemplar labs, the AP CSA Labs, have been developed for teachers to use in the AP Computer Science A course.

• AP CSA teachers will be able to access all instructional resources for each lab (Teacher and Student Guides, solutions and code files) through their AP Course Audit accounts.

  • Magpie, the first lab, can be incorporated early in the course and involves simple string processing and conditional execution.

  • Picture, the second lab, involves 2-dimensional array manipulation in the context of image processing.

  • Elevens, the third lab, provides an example of larger object-oriented program design.

• Each AP Computer Science Lab includes :

  • teacher guides along with Java code.

  • student guides along with Java code.

• Each teacher guide includes :

  • concepts covered, learning objectives, and necessary prerequisite knowledge,

  • guidelines on when each lab might fit naturally into a course and suggestions on the use of the materials,

  • suggested problems and questions for use during each activity, and sample assessment exercises.

• The Student Guides for the AP CSA Labs can be found on the AP Computer Science home page:

  • http://apcentral.collegeboard.org/apc/public/courses/teachers_corner/222163.html

• Teachers may use the provided labs, utilize laboratory exercises from textbook authors or other sources, and/or develop their own labs.

• When choosing labs, teachers must carefully evaluate the activities, objectives, and materials to be certain that the labs address the characteristics outlined above.

Analysis of Student Performance using prior Exams [shared drive]

Previous years' Exam Information [ available on Exam page (scroll down) at AP Central]

Share Exam Preparation Ideas

John's practices....

• On each test, I transition students from a non-AP course by adding a few MC questions and one FR Question.

• I give a full 3-hour Mock Exam about 2 weeks prior to AP Exam...and practice having students score each other's Free Response answers

• NO PRONOUNS...except "this"

• Keep track of all AP scores...they may reveal long-term patterns (look for a pattern) [see Scores tab on https://meinzeit.com/personal/vitae.htm]

Definitions & Insights

• Syllabus: The syllabus is a course-long plan that includes explicit evidence that each AP curricular requirement is addressed in the course. It is also a document that the teacher submits to the College Board as part of the Audit Process to receive Course Authorization

• Audit Process: A process whereby the College Board -

  1. receives an electronic copy of the syllabus from the teacher (requires teacher to have a College Board login)

  2. receives an electronically submitted Audit Form from a school administrator (requires Course Audit Administrator to have a College Board login) and then

  3. has an experienced College Professor review the teacher's submitted syllabus to ensure that their syllabus addresses all of the curricular requirements listed in the official Course Description.

  4. The audit is an annual process.

  5. However, after the first year's Approval, the school's Course Audit Administrator can usually renew the course authorization without additional submissions from the teacher.

• Course Audit Form: This form lists all curricular and resource requirements of the AP course. Through AP Course Audit accounts,the form is completed by the teacher, submitted by the teacher to the school administrator for approval, and finalized by the school/district Course Audit Administrator to be submitted to the College Board.

• Authorization: A course with a finalized and submitted Course Audit Form and an approved syllabus is authorized to use the “AP™” designation on student transcripts.

• Retention of Authorization: a streamlined Audit process for a school's Course Audit Administrator to use when they have received prior Authorization for an AP course. For AP CSA this requires an Attestation that the teacher will include 20 hours of lab time in their course.

• Approval: Permission given by the school's Course Audit Administrator that assures to the College Board (via the Audit Form) that the school's AP course is being taught accurately.

• Insight #1: You may create & submit your own syllabus or you submit one of the sample syllabi.

• Insight #2: Prior to submitting your syllabus for auditing to the College Board website, a general self-evaluation checklist is on the audit website http://www.collegeboard.org/html/apcourseaudit

• Insight #3: If you already have an approved syllabus then you may only need a "Retention of Authorization" which requires an Attestation to a minimum of 20 hours of Lab time

Pre-2019: Sample Syllabi

look at the course resources (i.e. textbook & software) that matches your situation

• Syllabus 1 on pages 87 - 92 - Karel J. Robot...by Bergin, Joseph and Java Methods... by Litvin
• Syllabus 2 on pages 93 - 101 - Java Software Solutions...by Lewis, et al. and Barron's AP Computer Science by Teukolsky and Blown to Bits... by Abelson, et al
• Syllabus 3 on pages 102 - 112 - Karel J. Robot...by Bergin and Big Java... by Horstmann and Fundamentals of Java...by Lambert
• Syllabus 4 on pages 113 - 124 - Introduction to Programming with Greenfoot...by Kolling and and Java Methods... by Litvin

Pre-2019 : The 7 Curricular Requirements

Identify evidence that a participant's syllabus meets the 7 Curricular Requirements that address the Topic Outline in the official Course Description [see Section 2 Parts I, II, & III]

1. design & implement computer-based solutions to problems
2. use & implement commonly used algorithms and data structures
3. select appropriate algorithms and data structures to solve problems
4. code fluently in object-oriented paradigm using the programming language Java
5. use elements of the standard Java library from the AP Java subset in Appendix A of the official Course Description
6. includes a structured lab component comprised of a minimum of 20 hours of hands-on lab experiences
7. recognize the ethical and social implications of computer use

Summary of Key Take-Aways for this Workshop

Feedback on a 4 x 6 Note Card (select one or more and identify any that are unclear or unaddressed). Error Analysis

Equity and Access Policy Statement

The College Board strongly encourages educators to make equitable access a guiding principle for their AP programs by giving all willing and academically prepared students the opportunity to participate in AP. We encourage the elimination of barriers that restrict access to AP for students from ethnic, racial, and socioeconomic groups that have been traditionally underserved. Schools should make every effort to ensure their AP classes reflect the diversity of their student population. The College Board also believes that all students whould have access to academically challenging course work before they enroll in AP classes, which can prepare them for AP success. It is only through a commitment to equitable preparation and access that true equity and excellence can be achieved.

AP Central AP CSA webpage lists numerous classroom Instructional Resources

• Additional Curriculum Modules
• Teaching Units / Projects
• Ideas, Strategies, Nifty Assignments, etc. from Colleagues
• Advanced and Special Focus Topics
• Textbook, website, and software reviews