mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) (03/08/86)
In article <11577@watnot.UUCP> jjboritz@watnot.UUCP (Jim Boritz) writes: >Asides from all this marks cannot be assigned simply upon the appearance >of a program. For one thing marks must be assigned consistently. In >order to assign marks consistently the marking process must become somewhat >mechanized. This leaves you with a big problem when someone writes a >bunch of crap for a program and then asks you to try to find the problem >when it doesn't work. After pouring over this persons spaghetti for twenty >minutes trying to wrap your mind around logic which has been reversed three >times, all you find is a missing semi-colon. >At the end of it all you are still forced to give marks out for the parts >that worked. Au contraire. When I graded programs in the elementary courses, I gave out only 50% of the points on functionality. Everything else was on style. You had to have meaningful comments, you had to format the code in a certain way, and you had to make the stuff generally legible. I also took points off for incredibly convoluted code; here at UMCP we want people to write elegant and easily comprehensible code first, then worry about squeezing every last bit of performance out of it. (My definition of incredibly convoluted code was anything I couldn't follow; there's no excuse for someone in a freshman level course writing code that a reasonably intelligent grad student can't follow.) In my opinion, you can't hammer enough on style. C. Wingate
brian@ut-sally.UUCP (Brian H. Powell) (03/08/86)
In article <148@umcp-cs.UUCP>, mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) writes: > When I graded programs in the elementary courses, I gave out > only 50% of the points on functionality. Everything else was on style. [... discussion on style.] > > In my opinion, you can't hammer enough on style. > > C. Wingate If you don't mind flunking a lot of people, or curving a lot. I agree with Charley that IN ELEMENTARY (e.g., freshman/sophomore) COURSES, style is more important than functionality. I used to grade really tough on style. It helped get better style out of the students, but at the expense of grades (therefore at the expense of a student's enthusiasm and motivation.) You can bring their style up to a certain almost-acceptable level, but after that, they feel like you're nit- picking. (i.e., they felt they just couldn't please me, no matter what they did.) After a few semesters, I decided to lighten up on the points taken off. I still used lots and lots of red ink pointing out bad style. I still pointed out bad style in class. (displaying a bad program in front of the whole class. embarrasing...) The students worked to get the style better. I guess if you miss 50 out of 100 because of style, you get discouraged. If you miss 5 or 10 out of 100, you don't; you work to get those last 5 or 10 points. BUT, you still have to verbally impress the importance of style on them. Brian H. Powell UUCP: {ihnp4,seismo,ctvax}!ut-sally!brian ARPA: brian@sally.UTEXAS.EDU
avolio@decuac.UUCP (03/08/86)
In article <148@umcp-cs.UUCP>, mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) writes: > In article <11577@watnot.UUCP> jjboritz@watnot.UUCP (Jim Boritz) writes: > > >Asides from all this marks cannot be assigned simply upon the appearance > >of a program. For one thing marks must be assigned consistently. In > Au contraire. When I graded programs in the elementary courses, I gave out > only 50% of the points on functionality. Everything else was on style. ... I agree with Charley (Charley, is this historic!? :-)). When I taught I made it clear that part of the grade was on style and part of that was structure. I told them -- a bit facetiously -- that if I tacked it on the wall, stood back 5 feet, and it looked good (indentation, etc.) that was half the battle. You can teach style! You can grade on style! I'd rather have given to me a program that only worked half the time but that was written with 'style.' It is much easier to fix than a program that works 99% of the time, but is unreadable.-- Fred @ DEC Ultrix Applications Center UUCP: {decvax,seismo,cbosgd}!decuac!avolio INET: avolio@decuac.DEC.COM
rcj@burl.UUCP (Curtis Jackson) (03/09/86)
In article <4385@ut-sally.UUCP> brian@ut-sally.UUCP (Brian H. Powell) writes: >In article <148@umcp-cs.UUCP>, mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) writes: >> When I graded programs in the elementary courses, I gave out >> only 50% of the points on functionality. Everything else was on style. >[... discussion on style.] >> >> In my opinion, you can't hammer enough on style. > > If you don't mind flunking a lot of people, or curving a lot. > > I agree with Charley that IN ELEMENTARY (e.g., freshman/sophomore) >COURSES, style is more important than functionality. > I used to grade really tough on style. It helped get better style out >of the students, but at the expense of grades (therefore at the expense of >a student's enthusiasm and motivation.) You can bring their style up to a >certain almost-acceptable level, but after that, they feel like you're nit- >picking. (i.e., they felt they just couldn't please me, no matter what they >did.) Agreed, my profs used a lot more red ink on the papers than in the grade book for bad style (or would give you another chance to clean it up if it looked like you were really trying). But some of the people in my class were so, well, STUPID! Prof: "All Pascal programs turned in to me MUST be run through <DEC pascal beautifier program> before you turn them in or I will not grade them." There were some students who turned in their 5th or 6th assignment AGAIN without running them through the beautifier. I think at that point he should have failed them on the assignments -- I sure wouldn't want to think that I was passing students like that through my class to go out and work in the job market! What if some of them started coding military applications *shudder*? -- The MAD Programmer -- 919-228-3313 (Cornet 291) alias: Curtis Jackson ...![ ihnp4 ulysses cbosgd mgnetp ]!burl!rcj ...![ ihnp4 cbosgd akgua masscomp ]!clyde!rcj