At regular intervals, you will be assigned to read articles and excerpts related to the course material. You will be asked to perform various activities to indicate your comprehension of the key ideas in the reading. These activities may include: writing a summary, answering questions about the reading, or participating in a forum discussion about the reading.
If the reading involves multiple articles/chapters, then you only need to perform one activity (e.g., submit only one summary, not one summary per article/chapter).
When you turn in a response, it should be less than one page long (expected length: approximately 1/2 - 2/3 page). Quality is valued over quantity. Submissions over one page will receive no credit. Assume that the reader is a competent computer scientist who has not read the article before.
This section describes the format of a reading summary. Not every assignment is a reading summary.
Each summary should contain the following:
The summaries will be graded on a four point scale as indicated above, with focus on quality answers.
Be sure to include specifics and back up your statements with data from the article or your particular experiences. Provide minimal, if any, direct quotes &mdash this is your summary. Overall, our intention is to use the summaries as a learning tool, promoting analysis of the readings. They should not take very long to complete. If you summarize the main points from the article, and provide a reasonable critical analysis, you should get full points.