It was one of the five initial pilot programs for the AP CS Principles course being developed by the College Board and the National Science Foundation. We offer it as CS10 at Berkeley. How is BJC Special? We're bringing BJC to New York City!
A list of suggested programming languages is provided in the Instructional Approaches section of the AP Computer Science Principles Course and Exam Description (.pdf/2.05 MB). Though this is not a comprehensive list, it is a point of reference to determine what will work best for a student.
Our syllabus has been approved by the College Board for this Academic Year. AP Computer Science Principles introduces students to the foundational concepts of computer science and challenges them to explore how computing and technology can impact the world.
AP CS Principles. The AP Program designed AP Computer Science Principles with the goal of creating leaders in computer science fields and attracting and engaging those who are traditionally underrepresented with essential computing tools and multidisciplinary opportunities.
The Hello World AP CSP curriculum is a one-of-a-kind, where students explore computing topics and programming through Virtual Reality and Python!
The AP Computer Science A course focuses on computing skills related to programming in Java.
In 2021, the AP Computer Science Principles exam had an above-average pass rate of 66.5% and a below-average perfect score rate of 12.4%. Most students find this AP test challenging but can pass comfortably.
AP Computer Science Principles is rated as the easiest AP class by real AP class alumnae, with an average difficulty rating of just 2.8 / 10 (1 = easiest), though the 2021 pass rate of 67% is not especially high.
The Three Easiest AP ClassesAP Psychology. With a reputation as one of the easiest AP classes, it comes as no surprise that AP Psychology is also one of the most popular—288,511 students took the exam in 2021. ... AP Comparative Government and Politics. ... AP Environmental Science.
United States History, Biology, English Literature, Calculus BC, Physics C, and Chemistry are often named as the hardest AP classes and tests. These classes have large curriculums, tough tests, and conceptually difficult material.
According to the College Board, these courses “can be taken in any order”. If you have extensive coding experience, this is probably solid advice. If not, we would recommend starting with APCSP.
The two exams differed majorly as AP Computer Science Principles was less stressful with 2/3 parts of the exam completed in class while AP Computer Science A was a classic AP exam with multiple choice sections and free response questions.
The AP Calculus AB exam is historically one of the hardest AP exams to pass. Its passing rate may look high at 58%, but that's because it's one of the less popular AP exams with a smaller self-selected group of students taking the exam. It begs the question of whether or not it's even worth taking AP Calc.
Going up the selectivity chain, the average at Harvard is eight AP classes. To be competitive at some of the most highly selective colleges in the country, 8-12 AP courses may be the sweet spot amount, assuming the student can handle that level of rigor.
1:376:16How to get a 5 on AP Computer Science Principles | Study Tips 2021YouTubeStart of suggested clipEnd of suggested clipAnd you need to be as explicit as possible you aren't writing an english essay it's not supposed toMoreAnd you need to be as explicit as possible you aren't writing an english essay it's not supposed to be flowery. They're basically just grading you off of do you take the boxes.
AP Spanish is a rigorous language course for students since grammatical, tense, and vocabulary terms must be learned and memorized. However, according to the most recent AP Spanish exam scores, students excelled on the test. With proper study techniques, students can succeed in this class.
The BJC Curriculum. The authors of the BJC curriculum think that computer programming is one of the most satisfying of all human activities —it's generally fun (when it's not frustrating because of a bug you can't find), but it's what Seymour Papert called "hard fun," mind-stretching and, because the authority is the computer rather than ...
It's not easy to preserve beauty and joy when translating a course taught by its authors into a curriculum for widespread use. Too much scaffolding in a project and the joy is gone; too little scaffolding and the student feels helpless and incompetent.
Just as the idea of abstraction is central to, and inseparable from, the idea of programming, the practice of abstraction is central to programming. We constantly encourage students to use layers of abstraction to structure a programming project.
BJC uses Blown to Bits to teach the social implications of computing. This is a free book (downloadable PDF files) under the Creative Commons license.
These videos are topic based (less than 10 mins each) were used in our edX and SPOC courses.
Forum for all BJC teachers to ask each other for help, share best practices and knowledge, and to lean on each other. For access, fill out the linked form.
beginning of content: Students can develop any program they choose (e.g., an app, a game, art design, etc.) with their choice of programming language to meet all the criteria in the Create performance task.
Note: While teacher may choose to do some programming instruction using HTML, it should be noted that HTML is not an acceptable programming language to use when completing the Create performance task.
An AP CS Principles Curriculum. The Beauty and Joy of Computing (BJC) is an introductory computer science curriculum developed at the University of California, Berkeley, intended for non-CS majors at the high school junior through undergraduate freshman level.
Snap! (formerly BYOB) is a visual, drag-and-drop programming language. It is an extended reimplementation of Scratch (a project of the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab) that allows you to Build Your Own Blocks. It also features first class lists, first class procedures, and continuations. These added capabilities make it suitable for a serious introduction to computer science for high school or college students.
AP offers two computer science courses—AP Computer Science A and AP Computer Science Principles. Students can take the courses in any order. The AP Computer Science Principles course complements AP Computer Science A by teaching the foundational concepts of computer science as it aims to broaden participation in the study of computer science.
Research shows that AP Computer Science Principles is making headway in diversifying computer science participation since its launch . See the 2020 research findings.
The BJC Create Task pages are designed to be a support to students as they complete these College Board tasks and should be treated as a supplement to the official College Board materials. The College Board website and documentation should be consulted regularly and considered the final word on the requirements of the Create Task. The BJC pages are not intended to be a complete resource and may not contain the most up to date information. They are provided to help clarify requirements that have been confusing to students.
BJC does not include the CSP Explore Curriculum Requirement, which, despite its name, is not required. Instead, BJC fulfills this requirement through several social implications labs across the year as described in the course syllabus.
Do I have to complete the AP Course Audit process before I start teaching this course?
Are students required to use the AP Digital Portfolio to take the AP Exam and receive an AP score?