What're good extra activities to do for Computer Science?
Computer Science/Computing/Forensic Computing are my main choices next year, but I have nothing to talk about when it comes to extra curricular activities. The only thing I've done is work at a charity shop (stacking shelves mainly) and a mentoring project at my school where we help kids in Year7 with their work.
There aren't any lectures about computer science that I can find, all the taster courses were during the summer holidays (I was ill, so couldn't go anywhere) and there doesn't appear to be any short courses/training that're in the UK.
Please help! What else can I do outside school that'll look good for Computing, before the UCAS deadline?
There aren't any lectures about computer science that I can find, all the taster courses were during the summer holidays (I was ill, so couldn't go anywhere) and there doesn't appear to be any short courses/training that're in the UK.
Please help! What else can I do outside school that'll look good for Computing, before the UCAS deadline?
stuff you enjoy?
I've been doing some stuff from these
http://projecteuler.net/
http://www.olympiad.org.uk/
put it in my statement and gave an example
http://projecteuler.net/
http://www.olympiad.org.uk/
put it in my statement and gave an example
To be honest if you are doing computer science, I recomend that you study your arse off, you will constantly be busy,there is so much reading to do,the languages we learn are on the up, we now have to learn up to 10 languages, not as easy as you think, some universities have the luck of using c# but if you get c to c++ or java you could struggle especially if you have never done any before, and you will have to build constant wrking programs, personal experience its not that easy, and the math side is only a part of it. The end result will be good but as Nat400 said try putting them or something like that, and enjoy the challenge
Original post by Nat400
I've been doing some stuff from these
http://projecteuler.net/
http://www.olympiad.org.uk/
put it in my statement and gave an example
http://projecteuler.net/
http://www.olympiad.org.uk/
put it in my statement and gave an example
That's really interesting. If only I knew about that sooner, it appears the competition has just finished
Could you explain the projecteuler one though please? It's a website that gives you math problems which you solve right? How did you relate it to Computing when writing about it in your personal statement?Original post by thnkhppythghts
That's really interesting. If only I knew about that sooner, it appears the competition has just finished Could you explain the projecteuler one though please? It's a website that gives you math problems which you solve right? How did you relate it to Computing when writing about it in your personal statement?
Could you explain the projecteuler one though please? It's a website that gives you math problems which you solve right? How did you relate it to Computing when writing about it in your personal statement?I didn't enter the competition I've just been experimenting with some of the problems from their previous competitions.
for Project Euler, you'll need to a write programs as well as have a good understanding of maths to solve the problems. They're quite hard though I've only done a few.
Learn a programming language. (If you already know one, then learn a harder one. If you know php, learn java, java learn C++, C++, learn assembler, etc.)
Install linux and *use* it. (If you're already using linux, install arch / gentoo. Make sure to compile the kernel)
Take CS AS/A-level, as an extra. (If your school doesn't offer it, take it self study)
Make something big, as a project. (could be used for EPQ)
Study an open university course in computing. (They're currently revaping the curriculum to focus on IT, so they might not be offered any more)
Start a programming / computer science club. (focusing on games will help attract participants)
Along with those, you could pretty much anything mathematical. My local university has a maths club, which is help once a month. If you want to do this, you could take F. Maths (self study, if nessecary), or even STEP. There a lot of maths competitions that you can enter.
Install linux and *use* it. (If you're already using linux, install arch / gentoo. Make sure to compile the kernel)
Take CS AS/A-level, as an extra. (If your school doesn't offer it, take it self study)
Make something big, as a project. (could be used for EPQ)
Study an open university course in computing. (They're currently revaping the curriculum to focus on IT, so they might not be offered any more)
Start a programming / computer science club. (focusing on games will help attract participants)
Along with those, you could pretty much anything mathematical. My local university has a maths club, which is help once a month. If you want to do this, you could take F. Maths (self study, if nessecary), or even STEP. There a lot of maths competitions that you can enter.
you gotta think loads of computer science courses are different, not guaranteed to cover the same stuff at all, those lucky lot will cover c++ but some like mine cover java, i heard others covering c# and others mainly covering other stuff, all the other stuff u need to learn,php,sql,learn to use linux as standard, assembler and so on and good luck 
Original post by britishgoose01
the languages we learn are on the up, we now have to learn up to 10 languages, not as easy as you think, some universities have the luck of using c# but if you get c to c++ or java you could struggle especially if you have never done any before
Explain in more noobish terms please :-)
Original post by thnkhppythghts
Explain in more noobish terms please :-)
My best interpretation. I apologise if I'm wrong!
A good programmer should be able to program in any language. The best way to teach someone to do this is to require them to learn a lot of different languages, so that they learn lots of different programming styles. Some languages are significantly easier to program in than others. C / C++, for example, are much more complicated than c#. Memory management and pointers cause problems for most people when they first meet them. I've heard figures that 75% of dropouts occur when these concepts are introduced, and they are only found in lower level languages like c/c++.
Original post by Luke_C
My best interpretation. I apologise if I'm wrong!
A good programmer should be able to program in any language. The best way to teach someone to do this is to require them to learn a lot of different languages, so that they learn lots of different programming styles. Some languages are significantly easier to program in than others. C / C++, for example, are much more complicated than c#. Memory management and pointers cause problems for most people when they first meet them. I've heard figures that 75% of dropouts occur when these concepts are introduced, and they are only found in lower level languages like c/c++.
A good programmer should be able to program in any language. The best way to teach someone to do this is to require them to learn a lot of different languages, so that they learn lots of different programming styles. Some languages are significantly easier to program in than others. C / C++, for example, are much more complicated than c#. Memory management and pointers cause problems for most people when they first meet them. I've heard figures that 75% of dropouts occur when these concepts are introduced, and they are only found in lower level languages like c/c++.
I see (sort of) XD. Can you learn that stuff from websites or books or is it one of those things that you need a course in? :/
In my opinion, it's better to learn from a website or book. You can learn at your own pace, and learn whatever is most useful to you. I think it's a better way of learning, since you actually get to fail, find out why, and then understand the problem. If you're learning programming as part of a taught course, then you avoid those pitfalls only because they're pointed out to you. I tend to find that my friends who've taken computing courses know that they can't do something, but not why they can't do it.
I don't remember using any specific resource, though. All you really need is to download a good IDE, and mess around with it. Follow a few tutorials, then start adapting what you know to make whatever seems interesting to you. When you get stuck on something, look it up. Eventually you'll need to know the more advanced concepts, to be able to do what you need to do. When you make a particularly large project, you realise how confusing the code gets and learn about styles and paradigms. Eventually you start to pull in the other aspects of computer science. You need to learn how to write an efficient algorithm, and how to decide what efficiency actually is. You need to learn about how a computer represents data. When you're trying to optimise your code, you'll start to think about what your code is actually making the processor do, and how the hardware works.
Learning from a course is probably going to be quicker, but it really depends on how interested and committed you are.
(Disclaimer: I'm not a computer science student, and I've never taken a real CS course. Take my advice with a pinch of salt
)
I don't remember using any specific resource, though. All you really need is to download a good IDE, and mess around with it. Follow a few tutorials, then start adapting what you know to make whatever seems interesting to you. When you get stuck on something, look it up. Eventually you'll need to know the more advanced concepts, to be able to do what you need to do. When you make a particularly large project, you realise how confusing the code gets and learn about styles and paradigms. Eventually you start to pull in the other aspects of computer science. You need to learn how to write an efficient algorithm, and how to decide what efficiency actually is. You need to learn about how a computer represents data. When you're trying to optimise your code, you'll start to think about what your code is actually making the processor do, and how the hardware works.
Learning from a course is probably going to be quicker, but it really depends on how interested and committed you are.
(Disclaimer: I'm not a computer science student, and I've never taken a real CS course. Take my advice with a pinch of salt
)Original post by Luke_C
My best interpretation. I apologise if I'm wrong!
A good programmer should be able to program in any language. The best way to teach someone to do this is to require them to learn a lot of different languages, so that they learn lots of different programming styles. Some languages are significantly easier to program in than others. C / C++, for example, are much more complicated than c#. Memory management and pointers cause problems for most people when they first meet them. I've heard figures that 75% of dropouts occur when these concepts are introduced, and they are only found in lower level languages like c/c++.
A good programmer should be able to program in any language. The best way to teach someone to do this is to require them to learn a lot of different languages, so that they learn lots of different programming styles. Some languages are significantly easier to program in than others. C / C++, for example, are much more complicated than c#. Memory management and pointers cause problems for most people when they first meet them. I've heard figures that 75% of dropouts occur when these concepts are introduced, and they are only found in lower level languages like c/c++.
i dnt know c language but aparently if you learn 1 of the languages you will pick up the others a little easier,however i have friends who complain after al lthe yrs of learning say java there forced to learn c++ and never use java again and same with other languages.
The main thing is you need to understand the concepts, and sadly what i have found since starting and going to university for these yrs is they dnt teach squat. They will more than likely teach you if you pay the money and go to oxford or cambridge. In our crappy state universities we are shown lecture slides, poorly advised, tutorials if they try to help they will either help so you struggle to understand or if they really wanna help there is just too big a class and they cant,then they get phd students to help who will be useless.
you can learn from books if you read them over and over and over....from prob the age of 10 or if you study this stuff in school like our easter euro neighbours do
Theres some excellent online tutorials, only explain to a certain extent and they will assume you understand a fair bit already. MY friend is going to be making a programming teaching site, from the very basics, if he does il post the link
My personal statement was said to be very good and led to me getting reduced offers from 2 top 10 universities (not blowing my own trumpet, just explaining why I'm giving you this advice).
At school I did a lot of work in Flash, Flash works through ActionScript, I therefore had quite a lot of experience in this language and at the time (2010 entry) Flash was very big and it looked quite good to say I've learnt this language and built a standalone PC/Mac application using it in an attempt to educate younger children. I did this in one of my A level ICT modules but it was very useful, I did have to do a lot of extra reading and spent a lot of time developing it even further.
I like building and designing websites, this is much easier now through the increased use of WordPress and other CMSs but again back then it looked good that I was comfortable using HTML, PHP and CSS. So its not necessarily directly related but they're all languages which show that you do have experience in programming (none are programming languages really but still), they loved that though.
The New Turing Omnibus is a very dull and boring book before you've started your course (I didn't mention this book at all in my PS but should've in hindsight) but have a look through and try to make some sense of it. If you can mention it in your PS then go for it although if not then don't, don't make yourself look like an idiot!
I mentioned how I was learning Java and C++ in my spare time as well as actually creating basic applications with the two such as calculators and name games; both very easy and a lot of info is available on these all over the internet.
I actually made an app for Nokia smartphones whilst in 6th form which was pretty basic and rather easy to create although again, at that time this was seen as pretty advanced. This again was done in Flash and ActionScript.
At school I did a lot of work in Flash, Flash works through ActionScript, I therefore had quite a lot of experience in this language and at the time (2010 entry) Flash was very big and it looked quite good to say I've learnt this language and built a standalone PC/Mac application using it in an attempt to educate younger children. I did this in one of my A level ICT modules but it was very useful, I did have to do a lot of extra reading and spent a lot of time developing it even further.
I like building and designing websites, this is much easier now through the increased use of WordPress and other CMSs but again back then it looked good that I was comfortable using HTML, PHP and CSS. So its not necessarily directly related but they're all languages which show that you do have experience in programming (none are programming languages really but still), they loved that though.
The New Turing Omnibus is a very dull and boring book before you've started your course (I didn't mention this book at all in my PS but should've in hindsight) but have a look through and try to make some sense of it. If you can mention it in your PS then go for it although if not then don't, don't make yourself look like an idiot!
I mentioned how I was learning Java and C++ in my spare time as well as actually creating basic applications with the two such as calculators and name games; both very easy and a lot of info is available on these all over the internet.
I actually made an app for Nokia smartphones whilst in 6th form which was pretty basic and rather easy to create although again, at that time this was seen as pretty advanced. This again was done in Flash and ActionScript.
Original post by hypercaine.
My personal statement was said to be very good and led to me getting reduced offers from 2 top 10 universities (not blowing my own trumpet, just explaining why I'm giving you this advice).
At school I did a lot of work in Flash, Flash works through ActionScript, I therefore had quite a lot of experience in this language and at the time (2010 entry) Flash was very big and it looked quite good to say I've learnt this language and built a standalone PC/Mac application using it in an attempt to educate younger children. I did this in one of my A level ICT modules but it was very useful, I did have to do a lot of extra reading and spent a lot of time developing it even further.
I like building and designing websites, this is much easier now through the increased use of WordPress and other CMSs but again back then it looked good that I was comfortable using HTML, PHP and CSS. So its not necessarily directly related but they're all languages which show that you do have experience in programming (none are programming languages really but still), they loved that though.
The New Turing Omnibus is a very dull and boring book before you've started your course (I didn't mention this book at all in my PS but should've in hindsight) but have a look through and try to make some sense of it. If you can mention it in your PS then go for it although if not then don't, don't make yourself look like an idiot!
I mentioned how I was learning Java and C++ in my spare time as well as actually creating basic applications with the two such as calculators and name games; both very easy and a lot of info is available on these all over the internet.
I actually made an app for Nokia smartphones whilst in 6th form which was pretty basic and rather easy to create although again, at that time this was seen as pretty advanced. This again was done in Flash and ActionScript.
At school I did a lot of work in Flash, Flash works through ActionScript, I therefore had quite a lot of experience in this language and at the time (2010 entry) Flash was very big and it looked quite good to say I've learnt this language and built a standalone PC/Mac application using it in an attempt to educate younger children. I did this in one of my A level ICT modules but it was very useful, I did have to do a lot of extra reading and spent a lot of time developing it even further.
I like building and designing websites, this is much easier now through the increased use of WordPress and other CMSs but again back then it looked good that I was comfortable using HTML, PHP and CSS. So its not necessarily directly related but they're all languages which show that you do have experience in programming (none are programming languages really but still), they loved that though.
The New Turing Omnibus is a very dull and boring book before you've started your course (I didn't mention this book at all in my PS but should've in hindsight) but have a look through and try to make some sense of it. If you can mention it in your PS then go for it although if not then don't, don't make yourself look like an idiot!
I mentioned how I was learning Java and C++ in my spare time as well as actually creating basic applications with the two such as calculators and name games; both very easy and a lot of info is available on these all over the internet.
I actually made an app for Nokia smartphones whilst in 6th form which was pretty basic and rather easy to create although again, at that time this was seen as pretty advanced. This again was done in Flash and ActionScript.
I know it's been a while, but on the off chance you're checking your notifs, what were the reduced offers you got and what grades did you end up getting?
(edited 1 year ago)
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