Best Practices for Teaching .NET

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Best Practices for Teaching .NET

• R .Venkat Raman
• Institute of Systems Science, National
  University of Singapore

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Best Practices for teaching .NETDeveloping and
Teaching a Comprehensive .NET Curriculum

• R. Venkat Raman
• Institute of Systems Science
• National University of Singapore
• 25 Heng Mui Keng Terrace
• Singapore 119615
• rvenkat_at_iss.nus.edu.sg
• (65) 6874 2011

The views expressed in this presentation are
based on the experiences of the speaker while
working with ISS. It may not necessarily be the
same as the corporate views of ISS. No part of
this presentation may be quoted, reproduced or
used without the explicit written permission of
the speaker and/or ISS. All marks and names used
in this presentation are the property of their
respective owners.
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Agenda

• Introduction
• About ISS
• About .NET Courses in ISS
• A Comprehensive .NET Curriculum
• Designing a Course on .NET Software Development
• Our .NET Teaching Experiences
• Features and Challenges Myths and Realities
• Demos as we move along
• QA

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Introduction

• About Institute of Systems Science (ISS)
• Center for advanced education and applied
  research in IT.
• Established in 1981 as a semi-autonomous
  institution under National University of
  Singapore.
• Key Teaching and Research area
• Software Engineering
• Teaching staff about 30-40.
• Courses focus on
• Post Graduate Education
• Professional Training

http//www.iss.nus.edu.sg
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Our Educational Programs
Software Engineering Knowledge Engineering Part
Time Masters Program 2.5 to 5 Years
Short Courses CITPM Seminars
Full Time PG Program Non-IT Graduates 11 Months
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How are we different?

• Course Structure
• Teaching Methods
• Focus Areas

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Our Training Methodology

• Pedagogy
• Lectures
• Practical Case Study Based Learning
• E-Learning
• Focus
• Technology
• Enterprise
• Research
• Tailored Approach

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.NET Courses _at_ ISS

• .NET platform enters our Courses
• Seminars
• Technology Update Seminar since early 2002
• Course Units
• Elective Modules for M Tech since Mid 2002
• Program
• The first end to end .NET Based Curriculum PG
  Dip
  since Mid 2002
• Professional Short Courses
• Since early 2003

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ISS Student Project with .NET

• .NET based software for our Clients
• Pioneering student projects using .NET for
• A large Singapore hospital, April 2002
• Call Center Management (VB.NET)
• AKQA, April 2003
• eMarketing Solution (ASP.NET)
• IATA, April 2003
• Workflow Management System (ASP.NET)
• A Telecom Company
• Area Code Management System
• and more

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Birth of the .NET Courses Series
the new beginning
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Curriculum Review

• Two-Yearly Reviews provide the impetus
• Purpose
• To review the existing course and propose
  additions, modification or removal of topics.
• Crucial ingredient
• Helps in keeping the curriculum up-to-date
• Helps in students gaining the correct skill-set
  with good employment prospects
• Panel consists
• ISS Faculty
• External Members from Academia, and
• Representatives from Industry

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SA Curriculum

• Program Objectives
• Student Profile
• Base Structure Modular Organization
• Analysis and Design Subjects
• Client Server Application Design Methodology
  (ISS)
• Technology Management Subjects
• Computer Architecture
• Networking
• Project Management
• Programming Subjects
• VB Series
• Java Series

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Evolution of SA Curriculum

• Year 2002 Review
• Review Committee Findings
• The existing Curriculum is well organized
• Students graduating are quite competent
• Their skills match the current needs of industry
• Review Committee Views and Recommendation
• There is good supply of VB developers in the
  market
• There is a potential demand for .NET developers
• The program should try to move towards .NET,
  latest by 2003 intake

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Moving to .NET

• ISS Team Decision
• Come, lets move not 2003, but 2002 not
  .NET for SA, but .NET for ISS
• We got prepared

thats just the start
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The Result

• Comprehensive .NET suite of Courses
• Graduate Diploma in Systems Analysis - First of
  its kind to teach software development using a
  .NET supported approach
• Provides 34 Days of Comprehensive .NET Coverage
• With potential expansions for further offerings
• ISS Today has
• .NET Teaching Team
• .NET Courseware
• .NET-Ready Students

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Our Future .NET Directions

• Professional Courses
• Short Courses
• Diploma.NET
• Mobile Technology
• Close association with .NET community
• Collaborations at various levels
• Consulting

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The TEN myths on .NET Curriculum(moving,
developing teaching)
the road to success is never easy
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Moving to .NET

• A deluge of questions
• What is to be taught?
• How would we upgrade staff?
• What resources do we need?
• When to launch?
• How do we manage risks?
• How much should we re-develop?
• Should we teach Traditional Technology and then
  launch the students on to .NET ?
• Should .NET be taught as the backbone ?
• VB.NET or C.NET or ?
• Would moving to .NET impact the other modules?

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• You cannot draw a trend line with just one point
  (x,y).
• - The Statistician
• TENET
• Our experience is just one sample.
• It may the same as yours.
• But again it may not apply at all!

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 1
• It would take a long time and considerable human
  effort to move to .NET Fear that we may not get
  there on time!
• Our Experience
• A good support from the higher ups is indeed
  necessary since this is a significant change!
• A well coordinated effort helped us achieve this
  in relative short time.

BANG!
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.NET Development Project
Development Manager
Lecturers (2)
TeachingAssistant
TeachingAssistant
TeachingAssistant
Evaluation
Design
Development
Deployment
Start
Teach
120 Calendar Days
Phase 1
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.NET Development Project

• Strategy
• Courseware Reuse
• From Past
• For Future

• In-process Lectures
• Pre-development
• Post-development
• Cross Train

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 2
• The .NET Framework is Big, therefore there is a
  lot more to teach!
• Our Observation
• Yes, it is big.
• By careful structuring of the course, it is
  possible to teach essentials of .NET and prepare
  the students.

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Understanding the .NET
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What to include or exclude
Depth of Knowledge Imparted
Course Topics
Course Track
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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 3
• We would need to throw away the existing modular
  organization and restructure everything from
  scratch if we need to move to .NET
• The ground reality
• An existing course can be well adapted .NET with
  minimal changes to the structure or the duration
  of a course.
• Yes, we would change the technology do not
  tamper with the pedagogy.

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Existing Curriculum

• Base Course Structure (SA)
• Programming Subjects (taught as a vertical chain)
• Microsoft Platform (28 Days)
• Fundamentals of Programming (BASIC Constructs)
• UI Development (VB6)
• SQL Programming (Standard SQL)
• Client Server Programming (VB6, ADO, MSRW
  Crystal RW)
• Internet Programming (ASP HTML, Multimedia)
• COM / MTS
• Java Platform (15 Days)
• Java (Part 1)
• Java Language (taught as a second language)
• Object Oriented Programming (Emphasis)
• Java (Part 2)
• Applets / Servlets / JDBC

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The .NET Track for Dip SA

• Mapping the Curriculum Structure

OOP (C)
OOP
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.NET Subjects for M Tech

• .NET Elective Modules (Three scenarios)
• E-Business Architecture and Design
• Introduces .NET Architecture in context touches
  on integration issues.
• Windows Programming
• Migrated to C .NET
• Was traditionally taught with C MFC
• Concentrates on Windows Forms Development
• UI for DB applications
• Web Services (.NET)
• New Course
• Teaches XML-Web Services Technology Development

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 4
• Teaching .NET requires a lot of investment in
  terms of resources.
• What we found
• Our additional investment is not significant.
• Our existing Hardware meet present .NET needs.
• Believe we may need some investment for future
  expansions, though.
• The .NET Framework is Free.
• And what about VS.NET licensing!
• A big thanks to MSDN-AA
• And what about Books?
• Oops! Dont forget the manpower
  That is significant!

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 5
• Since the old curriculum used VB we should move
  to VB.NET
• Our analysis
• Considering the pros and cons of using various
  .NET languages we came to the conclusion that
  VB.NET has no significant advantage over using
  any other .NET language for our course.

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C vs VB.NET

• I am sure we can argue on this for ages
• but let me quickly list some considerations we
  had.

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 6
• Teaching .NET requires Visual Studio .NET
• What we feel
• VS .NET is not a must for learners.
• Hey it isn't VB any more!
• True An IDE like Visual Studio is very
  productive from learner perspective.
• ISS modules do use non-IDE based development.
• Third Party tools can also be used!

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Demo

• Lets have a look at some of the options

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 7
• It would be difficult to teach language
  constructs at the rapid pace we do (at least in
  comparison to VB/BASIC).
• C being object oriented, we may need to teach OO
  in conjunction with Programming Constructs and
  change the structure/sequence.
• Our Conclusion
• Programming constructs, when taught in native
  form does have a perceptible impact in terms of
  improved learning ability.
• We did manage to teach OO as an independent
  entity.
• Of course there must be a method in madness!

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Demo

• Our Approach
• Lets keep our modular organization intact.
• Lets stick to proven approach.
• Lets see how we use C for beginners
• Custom Libraries
• The Shared Assembly ISS.RV.LIB
• Customizing the Visual Studio.NET

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 8
• .NET is just another technology. True it may
  have a lot of new features. But what is new in it
  teach CS Concepts!
• Trust me
• We had a wonderful time delivering good OOD
  concepts with ease using the .NET architecture
  for enterprise software development.

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Tying CS to .NET

• Lets have a look at just one sample
• The sexy DataSet

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The Object Orientation
DBStaffBroker
3
1
4
6
StaffListUI
dispStaffController
StaffCollection
2
5
Persist
DB
Staff
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Demo

• Understanding the Background
• The erstwhile(?) ADO
• Database Applications with .NET
• RAD
• Object Relational Mapping
• Deriving Entity Objects
• Tying to the Object Oriented Design
• Serialized

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 9
• The converse of Myth 8! Another school of
  thought.
• We have an existing courseware on another
  technology It would merely be a glorified
  clerical effort to get it up on the .NET
  platform!
• Our Experience
• Sometimes it is like being a Fish inside a .NET

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Teaching Problems

• Just some personal irritants while migrating to
  .NET
• ToString()
• internal
• Exception
• MesssgeBox
• Absence of
• Flexgrid
• Navigation (recordset like)
• MMC (COM like)

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Smiles for Teachers

• Some .NET/C features that
• add comfort to teachers or
• add value while teaching concepts
• Programming
• Main()
• struct
• foreach
• Multidimensional / Jagged array
• True UI Objects
• Form object
• Column Styles
• Providers
• A clean ADO.NET
• Web Form (code behind)

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Ten Myths on .NET Curriculum

• Myth 10
• Lecturers teaching .NET would receive a pay rise!
• Our Experience
• Hmmmm!

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Summary

• The most telling contribution of .NET is that
  it has made Software Development very productive.
  It has something to offer to everyone
• To enterprises, .NET makes
  development faster
• To software professionals, .NET
  makes development easier, and
• To me, .NET has made teaching more
  pleasurable.
•     - Venkat
• Institute of Systems Science,
• National University of Singapore.

Q A