Homework Three: Review of exam question

Homework is due on Friday 4th October 2013.

This is a very critical homework, knowledge is only part of the game at A level, you are expected to know things, but what they are actually focused on testing is can you apply that knowledge to specific contexts. It is the context that cannot be predicted, they can make these up till the cows come home. They will always stick to the topics we cover but they will come up with new questions to ask about those topics so exam technique is important. You need to go back through the exam question with the mark scheme. You need to look at each question individually, so organise a report in this way (question by question). When doing this task you need to be honest with yourself, there is no point kidding about why you scored what you scored.

Exam Mark Scheme answer here (Question 6)

Binary question answers here

For each question look at the following:

If you did well

• What specifically did you do/have you done to achieve this result?
• Look at the mark scheme why are the other answers given the correct ones? (look at the context of the question and  how they fit with it)

If you scored poorly or loosely

• Look at the mark scheme why are the answers given the correct ones? (look at the context of the question and  how they fit with it)
• Why did your answers not give you the marks? (were they off topic, did they not target the question asked, did you waffle, were you vague, did you start with a statement before explaining, did you state and not describe etc...)
• What mistakes did you make with your approach to the question? (did you read it before answering or did you assume you knew what the question was, did you read your answers back to check you were answering the question asked etc...)
• What will you do on future questions in order to ensure you don't make these same mistakes?

Once this task is complete I will ask you to enter a target into the Nilpit system under ILP (Individual learning plans) outlining what you need to do in future when tackling exam questions. You will also make an entry into your Learner Journal, stating an action you will take forward for the next homework.

Programming Glossary Keywords/Terms

The following are the keywords and glossary items I think you should of come across in the python book. Make sure you at least have definitions/explanations for these. If you have extra ones that's ok.

I've organised this by chapters

Chapter One

• Depreciated
• Console Window
• Platform independant
• Function
• Argument
• Case-sensitive
• String
• Statement
• Comments

Chapter Two

• List of Arguments
• Escape Sequence
• Concatenating strings
• Line continuation character
• Numeric Types (specify Integer, Float, Decimal)
• Mathematical operators (state the main ones from the book on page 29 given their purpose)
• Variable
• Legal variable name
• Assignment statement
• Self documenting code
• Return value
• String methods (state the purpose of the following ones -upper, lower, replace, strip [also known as trim in other languages])
• Logical error
• operator overloading
• Augmented Assignment operator (use the table on page 44 - most languages use something similar)

Chapter Three

• Sequential flow (Sequence)
• Import
• Module
• dot notation
• Branching
• Cryptography
• Conditions
• Comparison operators (cover those in table on page 56)
• Block
• If statement
• Else clause
• Else If (Elif as python calls it)
• While Loop
• sentry variable
• Initialisation
• Infinite loop (what causes one and how to create an intentional one)
• Tracing
• compound conditions
• logical operators (not, and, or)
• Algorithm
• Pseudo code
• Stepwise refinement

Chapter Four

• For loop
• element
• sequence (in python)
• iterate
• len() function
• sequential access
• random access
• indexing
• index out of range
• mutable and immutable
• constant
• lower()  and upper() functions
• slicing

Homework Two: Data representation Exam Question and Number bases sheet

This homework is due on Friday 20th September 2013. 

If you need to type up your answers make sure you reference each of the question parts appropriately (aii etc...)

A copy of the homework is available
exam question here and
number bases sheet here

Try the homework early then if you have any issues with this homework then you need to see me well before the hand in date to give you time to attempt the question again.

Python coding hand in date

You need to hand in to me an example of the code you have produced that you are most proud of by:

Monday 16th September 2013

This task is important as you will be expected to develop your own programming skills with support from me and this is just a first step.