Course Syllabus: Honors Visual Basic Programming

Course Syllabus: Honors Visual Basic Programming

“'It seems very pretty,' she said when she had finished it, 'but it's rather hard to understand!' (You see she didn't like to confess, even to herself, that she couldn't make it out at all.) 'Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas—only I don't exactly know what they are!

-Alice from Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
Course Content
The major goal of this course is to reinforce computing concepts to students who have previously taken an introduction to programming. These concepts include objects, properties, methods, functions, decision- making, loops, random number generation, Boolean logic, variables, parameters, arguments, and arrays will be introduced. Students can expect to develop these skills through a hands-on exercises and projects. Projects will include independent work as well as group work.

	Units		Programming Practice
Semester One	Unit 1 Introduction to Programming And Visual Basic	Computer Systems: Software and Hardware Programs and Programming Languages Controls and Programming Modifying Properties of Controls The Programming Process Visual Studio and Visual Basic Express	Load and run a computer application. Learn a new way to think. Learn how to arrange a sequence of instructions to carry out a task (solve a problem). Learn the specifics of programming with Visual Basic language.
	Unit 2 Creating Applications	Designing an Application Programming an Application Gathering Text Input Variables and Data Types Performing Calculations Debugging
	Unit 3 Algorithms, Pseudocode and Program Control	Algorithms, Pseudocode If … Then Selection Statement Assignment Operators Formatting text Message Boxes Focus on Program Design and Problem Solving: Building an Application
	Unit 4 Repetition Statements	Do While…Loop Do Until…Loop For… Next Loops Select Case Statements Building the Interest Calculator Application
	Unit 5 Scope, Parameters, Arguments, Option Strict	Scope Parameters, Arguments Pass-by-Reference vs. Pass-by-Value Option Strict Timers Date and Time Variables

	Units	Includes Standard Clusters*
Semester Two	Unit 6 Classes and Procedures	Functions Execution Control Sub Procedures Enum Random Numbers and Random Motion	Use logical reasoning. Use random numbers for statistic modeling. Using arrays to manipulate data. Learn about object-oriented programming and to apply concepts to other programming languages such as Java and C++.
	Unit 7 Arrays and Gui Design	Introducing Arrays Declaring and Allocating Arrays Sorting Arrays Designing and Constructing a Game
	Unit 8 Building your own classes and Objects	Adding a New Class to the Project Initializing Class Objects: Constructors Properties Controlling Access to Members
	Unit 9 String Processing and Files Printing and Structures	Fundamentals of Strings Extracting Substrings from Strings Replacing Substrings in Strings and other String methods Files and Streams Writing to a file Extracting Data from a file
	Unit 10 Introducing Graphics and Printing	GDI+ Introductions Constructing the Checkwriter Application Graphics Objects: Colors, Lines and Shapes The Balloon Application

Core Idea First Semester: Our focus first semester will be on
By the end of the first semester, in order to demonstrate mastery, students should be able to answer the following essential questions:

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  1.1 What Is a Computer?
  
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  1.2 Computer Organization2
  
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  1.3 Machine Languages, Assembly Languages and High-Level Languages
  
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  1.4 Visual Basic
  
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  1.5 Other High-Level Languages
  
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  1.6 Structured Programming3
  
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  1.7 Key Software Trend: Object Technology
  
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  1.8 The Internet and the World Wide Web
  
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  1.9 Introduction to Microsoft .NET
  
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  1.10 Test-Driving the Visual Basic AdvancedPainter Application
  
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  How do exponential functions model real-world phenomena?
  

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  How do logarithmic functions model real-world phenomena?
  
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  How can you use cross-sections of three-dimensional objects to create the different conic sections?
  
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  What are the different types of conic sections?
  
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  How do conic sections model real-world phenomena?
  

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  How can we restrict the domain of trigonometric functions to make them invertible?
  
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  How can you use the periodic behavior of trigonometric functions to model real-world phenomena?
  
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  How can we use the trigonometric identities to help verify proofs and manipulate and simplify trigonometric expressions?
  
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  How can the Law of Sines and the Law of Cosines be used to model and solve real-world problems?
  

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  How can the same curve be represented in Cartesian and in polar?
  

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  How do the arithmetic operations with numerals compare to the operations with matrices? With vectors?
  
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  How can you use matrices to model real-world phenomena?
  
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  How can you use vectors to model real-world phenomena?
  

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  Unit 1 Project/Test – end of September; Unit 2 Project/Test – mid-October
  
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  A Unit 3 project incorporating the curriculum will account for 25% of the student’s final grade (end of October).
  

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  Unit 4 Project/Test – mid-November; Mid-Unit 5 Project/Test – mid-December
  
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  A cumulative exam containing multiple choice, short answer, and essay questions accounting for 25% of the student’s grade (mid-January)
  

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  Unit 6 Project/Test – mid -March; Unit 7 Test –end of March
  
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  A project incorporating the curriculum will account for 25% of the student’s final grade (end of March).
  

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  Unit 8 Project/Test – mid-April; Unit 9 Project/Test – mid-May Unit 10 Projects – if time permits
  
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  A cumulative exam containing multiple choice, short answer, and essay questions accounting for 25% of the student’s grade (Seniors – end of May, underclassmen – June)