main page  —  COMP 335 Communicating Computer Science

CA4 – Reflective Report

This last continuous assessment is a quick report about how you perceived your lesson delivery, reflecting on how well the lesson plan could be put into practice, what observations you have made, and how you would modify future deliveries of your lesson.

Learning outcomes

  1. Critically reflect on the effectiveness of an activity given feedback from those who took part.
  2. Be able to design learning activities and create teaching material for those.

Content

Your report should cover the following sections:

  1. A brief description/summary of your lesson (~1/4 page).
    You can use an updated version of your sales pitch here.
  2. Your personal evaluation of how well your lesson worked with the three different groups you delivered it to (1/2–1 page).
    Could you achieve the learning outcomes listed on your lesson plan? Do you think you could change the perception of Computer Science for some of the students? Try to give (anecdotal) evidence for your verdicts; this can include the feedback forms.
  3. Your personal reflection on teaching (~1/2 page).
    Did you enjoy teaching your lesson? Have your views of teaching changed after taking COMP335? If so, how and why?
    (It might be insightful to revisit your personal statement from last year for the application to COMP335!)
  4. An updated lesson plan for your activity that incorporates your experiences with your lesson. This can be the same / contain identical parts as for CA2.
    You are not asked to redesign your lesson at this stage; try to only tweak the organization and structure of the delivery. You may want to add the following information:
    (a) Ideas for how to tailor the delivery to the ability and prior knowledge of a group where this is possible.
    (b) Practical hints on how to organize the lesson / prepare material; identifying likely pitfalls.
  5. A quick list of all changes to your lesson plan from above.
  6. A statement about publication and further use of your lesson plan and learning materials. (Your choice has no influence on the mark.) You can either
    (a) disallow any further use,
    (b) allow internal use for outreach activities,
    (c) allow the publication (with your name), e.g., on our outreach website under a Creative Commons License, so that other computer science educators can make use of your work and you have a public showcase of your work on our official website.

Format

Aim for around 1500 words of new writing (2–3 pages).
That is an indicative length; there are no penalties for going over or under per se, but you have to make sure you cover the points above.

There are no specific requirements for formatting and typesetting; just make it nicely readable and be consistent. Good typography always supports the reader in following your line of thought without being a distraction (“form follows function”).

Academic integrity

Make sure that all your sources are properly cited (in line with the Code of practice on assessment).
Your essay will be checked by TurnItIn’s plagiarsm checker.

Marking scheme

As a rough indication of the relative importance, the overall mark will consider the following criteria:

  • Reflection (40%)
    Has a meaningful reflection on the lesson delivery been reported? Are observations critically assessed and contextualized?
  • Updates to lesson plans (50%)
    Have changes implemented in deliveries been described? Does the updated lesson plan put experience from delivering the lesson to good use?
  • Grammar & Style (10%)
    The overall readability of the report.

The mark for your report is given for a sound evaluation of your delivery, not for the quality of the delivery itself (which has been assessed on CA3 already).
A critical report (where justified) can be just as valuable for this task as one with a more positive conclusion.