Welcome to CSFTC 2024! Read me!

[insyri]

Computer Science for the Curious, CSFTC, is a course made to promote the learning of STEM subjects through community and collaborative learning. The end goal of this course is to become familiar with programming concepts, collaborative engagement, and familiarity with real-world applications. However, to me, my most important goal to achieve is a new sense of community and a new perspective to your career and college choices.

I'm Noah, an IB Junior who is passionate about all things computers (who also hates computers when they refuse to work). I was inspired to start this course because of the many conversations I've had with students who are interested in STEM but had no idea where to start. See me yap more about myself here!

CSFTC is a course made to guide you into a journey of collaborative self-studying within the space of STEM. Every week or so, we meet up after school on Tuesdays in 8-210 to either work together on projects and share ideas or participate in a lecture that I personally host. Outside of those meetings, we interact on this platform to communicate about our misunderstandings, share our projects, host mini-events (watch parties anyone?), and discuss anything and everything STEM.

Sometimes, we'll work on projects as a whole to produce something cool, and other times, we'll come together to help each other solve our own problems, and other times, we'll compete against each other in competitive coding competitions. The hope is that every student who attends CSFTC finds a warm space to hang and learn together.

I encourage people of all backgrounds and skills to come participate! Even those who have no idea what a computer is.

I will be giving lectures on our meetups on occasions, but mostly, the learning will be done through your own interests by taking it home and start coding. That might sound a little daunting to a beginner, however, I hope it doesn't seem so much knowing that there's a community waiting to help you understand your problem and help accelerate your learning.

Guiding CSFTC, I have these goals in mind:

• I want to foster a new interest in STEM, or inspire a deeper interest in STEM within students by giving them an opportunity to explore STEM in a fun, exciting, and self-paced manner.
• I want to instill the knowledge of critical thinking, researching, and computer science skills, while creating a productive and engaging learning environment.
• I want to provide an insight to what computer science holds to attendees and the interesting aspects of the science.

To do this, I want to provide all kinds of support and resources to promote your success. Failures will be met, but what comes after is way more important.

Occasionally, I will fail to deliver as this is my first time doing a project this big, along with preparing and giving lectures. If you have any feedback, concerns, or questions about the way I do things, feel free to let me know.

Student contact: 4806848800 [at] students [dot] ocps [dot] net
Remind code: bearscsc

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Where to Start

I post announcements semi-weekly (twice a week) on what we'll be focusing on. You can find the most recent announcements within the 📢 Announcements channel. This will cover what topics we go over together, but also review on what we've learned so far and discuss we want to see in the near future.

If you are new here, it is recommended to introduce yourself in the 💬 General channel. :]

It is also recommended to download the GitHub mobile app just for the convenience of notifications whenever something new pops up in this repository. You can customize your notifications:

1. Set up a watch for this repository to receive notifications on any new updates.
2. Manage your push notifications on GitHub Mobile.
3. Learning how to use GitHub in general! If you're curious, that is. Start your journey.

To start learning, I recommend to pick out one of MIT's introductory courses to computer science listed here:

🛠 Resources - General CS Learning Resources

Channel Overview

• 📢 Announcements — Where I post updates about the course semi-weekly.
• 💬 General — Talk about everything and everything.
• 💡 Ideas & Feedback — Propose changes about the course, or provide feelings about the course.
• 🙌 Show & Tell — Show your peers what you have made!
• ❓ Q&A — Ask and answer questions.
• 🛠 Resources — A list of learning and utility resources.

A Note About Asking Good Questions and Forming Good Answers

When asking questions to our peers or on the internet, it is important to be clear, specific, and contextual. Our problems can be communicated well by considering the two following questions:

1. What are the circumstances of our inquiry?
   To understand the problem, it is helpful to describe our primary objective. What is it that we're trying to accomplish? How are we trying to do that? Are there any unusual circumstances that make this question unique?
2. What research have we done, and what attempts have we made based on this new information?
   By offering our awareness of the situation, clues can be given to our peers as to what might be missing from the puzzle, or more beneficial, what are we unaware of? By providing this context, we can deduce where the problem is an diagnose.

When answering these questions, it is critical to comprehend the other's perspective when responding to them, especially when helping a beginner. Giving too much information will overwhelm them, whereas giving too little information will not be so helpful. We must be patient and empathetic to achieve mutual understanding. To do this, it is suggested to make your complete answers formed in a similar way to this:

1. Explain the misunderstanding that our peer has.
   What is the weakness in our peer's understanding? What do they not know? And how might they go about thinking about it differently? If they wanted to dive deeper into their misunderstandings, what should the search up?
2. Explain the fault in an isolated form.
   How does the misunderstanding fall apart when applied in a general sense?
3. Explain the fault in the context of the problem.
   How does the misunderstanding fall apart when applied in this specific context? How does it fall through when presented with an edge case?
4. Propose a solution.

A Final Word

Do not be afraid to interact. This course is designed for your success as long as you remain active. Be civil, remain curious, and stay resilient.

Remember that setbacks and difficulties are all a part of the learning process, and embrace every opportunity that presents itself.
— Mr. Morales, Summer of 2023