Assessment Tool
Lecture 7: Functions
Content Tested: Functions and Benefits
Lecture Content:
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Functions
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Function control flow
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Two meanings of void
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Pre-written functions
Goals:
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Develop ability to apply principles and generalizations already learned
to new problems and situations
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Improve writing skills
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Learn concepts and theories of this subject
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Develop management skills
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Develop ability to perform skillfully
Assessment Technique: Directed Paraphrasing
Purpose:
This activity allows instructors to see how well students can communicate
ideas directed at a target audience.
Activity:
You will be doing this activity in pairs. Please find a partner in
the class.
Designate one person in the pair to be the Speaker and one person in
the pair to be the Listener. Don't worry -- both people will get
a chance to be the Speaker. You'll be discussing the concept of functions
in this activity.
Speaker: As the speaker, explain to the Listener what a function
is (in the context of C programming). Assume the Listener is a classmate
of yours who missed today's lecture.
Switch roles! The old Speaker is now the Listener and the old
Listener is now the Speaker.
Speaker: As the speaker, suppose you are the lead developer for
a team of programmers. Explain to your Listener, one of the programmers,
the importance of and reasons for using functions.
Possible Solutions:
Scenario 1:
The speaker might touch on the control flow -- what happens when functions
are called. They might also give examples of functions (printf, scanf)
that have been used thus far in the course. Another topic might be
the thought process in designing functions -- identifying a sub-problem
and writing the code just once. He or she might also give an example
function to explain the syntax.
Scenario 2:
This scenario should be more focused on the motivation for using functions.
These include writing code just once to perform an action, changing the
action just once in a function if the function needs to be changed, and
making code more organized into functional chunks.
Possible Uses of Activity:
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It is important that the instructor monitor groups' progress during the
exercise.
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Have students volunteer their paraphrases for the rest of the class.