I created this unit as part of a whole school initiative to improve pupils' awareness of study skills. The three pages discuss different types of learner and encourage pupils to consider how they will prepare for their next class assessment. A link to a BBC / Open University survey test allows pupils to test for their own learning type. Please leave feedback. Thanks

Make your lessons fun with Computational Thinking! Structured Query Language is a programming language used to manipulate information stored in databases. As with all programming languages the best way to learn its functions is through solving problems. In this series of fun worksheets (or possible homework sheets) are sets of problems that are solved by writing or interpreting SQL instructions. Students must either predict the output of SQL instructions or calculate the SQL that must have been used to produce some given output from a database. Set 1 includes an explanation of the uses of SEARCH, FROM and WHERE functions followed by 5 pages of questions. This style of learning is very well received by students who "love solving the problems".

This 16 page booklet is the first of three written to cover the process of creating a website from analysis to coding to final evaluation. Booklet 1 (analysis and design) covers: client - developer discussions requirements (user and functional) wireframe designs form designs website structure diagrams (navigation) prototypes 5 tasks have been written to accompany the booklet. These come with marking instructions and may be used in class, as homework exercises or even as assessments. Booklet 2 (implementation examples and task) covering HTML5, CSS and JavaScript coding is also available.

(Greg Reid has written two Computing text books for the Scottish education system. His resources are used in thousands of schools all over the world.) Computational Thinking (learning to think in a logical/problem solving way) is the buzz word in the teaching of programming. By teaching students to predict the outcome of small pieces of code they naturally become better at building their own programs. Although this homework uses Scratch program code, the code is simply a vehicle to ask the questions and the homework may be used with students who have never seen Scratch. Permission has been granted by the Scratch team to uses images of Scratch code. Have fun. My students loved these! Previously downloaded 30,000 times on a few websites comments have included: “Thanks, these look like really good examples and introduce code in a fun and engaging way.” “Very useful. I’ll use for a Maths class as well.” “Great examples to understand code. Thank you for sharing it.”

Welcome to the fictional town of Sandyhaig where the residents are desperately seeking to hire a data scientist to help with their Campaign for Better Buses. Students will take on the role of a data scientist learning: about Sandyhaig town along with the current bus routes and the data obtained on buses and passengers how to find the data they need for the campaign how to present the data in a meaningful easily understood way. To deliver this unit of work the following student files are included in the download: A 30 page, student booklet including tasks, examples and final projects of varying difficulty An appendix booklet with 10 appendices that cover skills like filtering, creating charts and creating a dashboard A large map of Sandyhaig town In addition, the following have been supplied for teaching staff: Advice on delivering the unit Answers to the tasks Advice on how each project can be completed Files used to create the appendices including the completed Excel files and dashboards This unit has been trialled in several schools with excellent feedback. Have fun.

Many students these days wish to be games programmers. This booklet is the first in a series of four that teaches students the tool and techniques of object orientated programming required to become a beginner games programmer. In Project 1 students will use the programming language Python, along with its add-on Pygame, to write an object orientated game called Balloon Burst. The booklet covers: . object orientated programming theory . coding Balloon Burst (with full instructions) . extension tasks . ways to improve your coding This could be your first step to becoming a games programmer! This booklet was co-written with my colleague David Stott for the Scottish Advanced Higher Computer Science course but could be used as part of any advanced programming course or games programming club. Project 2 is also available.

This unit was written to provide homework, class assessments or additional tasks to complement your own database teaching. The theme of the five table relational database provided is Scottish golf club members and their competition results. There are eight task sheets included as MS Word files: Task 1 – Analysis & Design – students must identify how problems identified from the beginner design can be solved through the introduction of more tables. Tasks 2,3 – Query design questions where the columns, tables, criteria and required functions are identified. Task 4 to 8 – SQL question sets covering: SELECT from multiple tables, alias, calculations, wildcards, aggregate functions (COUNT, MIN, MAX, AVG) and sub-queries. Two versions of task 8 are included showing solution as two separate queries (MS Access) and using a single query with a sub-query. All marking instructions are provided. The above tasks were initially written as homework/assessment style questions (I spent 20 years writing questions for the Scottish exam system) but I have since created database files should you wish your students to code the SQL. The database files are provided in three formats for different environments: Access files (a student version and others with the completed SQL tasks 2 to 8 queries) CSV files that you can use to import the table data and build the database Text files that contain SQL CREATE and INSERT statements which you could use to create the database on a database server Excel files, Python programs and explanations that can be used to add more of your own data.

(Greg Reid has written two Computing text books for the Scottish education system. His resources are used in thousands of schools all over the world.) Previously downloaded over 13,000 times, these four worksheets are an excellent introduction to Audacity. Audacity is a free program used to edit sounds for use as: ring tones, sound effects, backing tracks or spoken text. Each worksheet is very visual, providing a clear set of instruction on how to import, cut, mix and add effects to sound files. Some copyright free sounds are supplied for use with the unit of work. This resource was previously rated 4.9 from 20 ratings. Comments are shown below: "Brilliant set of materials, great design, so useful. Excellent, thank you." "How good does it feel when you find the PERFECT resource for what you want to do?! I'm doing Entry Pathway ICT with SEN pupils, we're going to make podcasts, but first I need to teach them how to use Audacity. This is wonderful, thanks"

Many students these days wish to be games programmers. This booklet is the second in a series of four that teaches students the tool and techniques of object orientated programming required to become a beginner games programmer. In Project 2 students will use the programming language Python, along with its add-ons Pygame and NumPy, to write an object orientated game called Tile Match. The booklet covers: . object orientated programming theory (inheritance, lists vs arrays, stacks, queues and insertion sort) . coding Tile Match (with full instructions) . extension tasks . ways to improve your coding This course could be your first step to becoming a games programmer! This booklet was co-written with my colleague David Stott for the Scottish Advanced Higher Computer Science course but could be used as part of any advanced programming course or games programming club. Project 3 is currently being written and is due for release in Sept 2017.

There are several skills required to be a good programmer. One of these is being able to modularise programs by identifying blocks of code. This Scratch homework is based around the “broadcast” block which can be used to modularise programs allowing greater control over order, reuse of code and gives sprites the ability to communicate with each other. The homework starts with a worked example. There are four questions making this homework about a 10-15 minute task. Note that question 4 will be out of reach of most younger pupils and should possibly set as a challenge (possibly with a certificate or prize for those who successfully solve it) Students love this style of problem solving homework. Have fun!

Many students these days wish to games programmers. Pygame is a fabulous addition to the extremely popular programming language Python. It is used to write professional looking computer games. This tutorial was originally written as part of a training day I led for staff interested in using Pygame as part of their teaching or as part of a games programming club. The training day was very well received so I have adapted the materials to allow self tuition by staff. If you have an interest in Python programming you'll love this extension to your own skills and knowledge. Although written for staff, pupils could easily follow the tutorial themselves. The knowledge acquired in this tutorial would allow you to deliver my PyGame student course: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/games-programming-using-pygame-project-1-balloon-burst-11303976 https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/games-programming-using-pygame-project-2-tile-match-11303996 I love teaching with PyGame. Have fun!

Make your lesson fun by introducing Computational Thinking! Structured Query Language is a programming language used to manipulate and extract information stored in databases. As with all programming languages the best way to learn its functions is through solving problems. In this series of fun worksheets (or possible homework sheets) are sets of problems that are solved by writing or interpreting SQL instructions. Students must either predict the output of SQL instructions or calculate the SQL that must have been used to produce some given output from a database. Set 3 includes an explanation of the uses of DISTINCT, GROUP, AS and ORDER functions followed by 3 pages of questions. This style of learning is very well received by students who "love solving the problems".

These exercises were written to solve that familiar problem of; “what homework do I give during practical lessons like programming?”. In this series of questions students are asked to consider small programming problems and design solutions using pseudocode or a programming language of their choice. Homework 5 of 10 includes questions on: - Input - Output - Conditional (if) Statement - Conditional Loop - Fixed Loop - Arrays - Len (length) Function Four additional theory questions cover Test Data, Reasons for Variable Use and Logic Problems with the Design. Two marking schemes give answers in: 1. Pseudocode and Python 2. Pseudocode and Visual Basic My students found this a very helpful aid to their understanding of program structures and problem solving. Questions 1-5 are available to purchase as a bundle. https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/practise-programming-questions-1-to-5-bundle-11543151

This 72 page booklet is the second of three written to cover the process of creating a website from analysis to coding to evaluation. Booklet 2 is split into two parts and should take between 20 and 40 hours to complete depending on the coding proficiency of your students. 2A - Implementation Examples: This 48 page booklet gives worked examples of HTML, CSS and JavaScript code using a cycling website as a scenario. 2B - Implementation Tasks: This 24 page booklet contains 13 tasks by the end of which students will have coded a 13 page “student cooking” website. The content covered can be briefly summarised as: Building a template page HTML 5 page structure (header, nav, main and footer) Positioning content (margins, padding, display & float) Building a navigation bar using lists and CSS HTML 5 forms (text, number, radio button, text area and select input) Interactivity using JavaScript mouse events (roll-over images, changing page styles, showing/hiding content) Please note that students should have a basic knowledge of HTML (head, body, links, headings, paragraphs and images) and a very basic understanding of CSS (changing text size, font, colour) before starting this course. The download comes with four additional sets of files: The complete cycling website created during booklet 2A. The complete cooking website created by students during the task booklet 2B. The student files required to get started. Additional content that can be dropped into blank pages to save student spending hours typing in content. Booklet 3 (testing and evaluation) will be coming soon.

This 18 page booklet is the third of three written to cover the process of creating a website from analysis to coding to evaluation. Booklet 3 takes students through how to comprehensively test a website for: Usability Navigation Media Forms A specially created “testing” version of the completed student cooking website is supplied for the tasks. This website has deliberately introduced errors which students are challenged to find in the tasks. Teacher notes are included listing the errors that were introduced. Booklet 3 also discusses how to evaluate a website by comparing the finished product to the original analysis. The tasks in Booklet 3 should take around 6 hours to complete. An accompanying booklet 3B contains collated analysis and designs for the Student Cooking website created in booklet 2B. This may be used as a reference when designing testing strategies.

This theory unit was written by my colleague Arthur Kerr and edited by myselfIt was written for the Scottish National 4/5 Computing course but could easily be used with other exam systems. It covers: - Networking - Security - Legality - Environment Please leave feedback

This resource was created to accompany my school's Internet Safety Unit. The resource can be used to instigate class discussion regarding the accuracy of Internet information, as an information sheet or maybe as a homework exercise (you'd have to write the questions though). Please leave feedback. Thanks.

(Greg Reid has written two Computing text books for the Scottish education system. His resources are used in thousands of schools all over the world.) Previously downloaded over 27,000 times, these 7 extension sheets continue the basic game created in "Creating a Computer Game using Scratch"(please download first). The sheets are designed to encourage and develop problem solving skills (solutions are supplied on the back of each worksheet) by adding new features to the basic game (sound, more fish, speech, game over screen, bonus items etc) This resource was previously rated 5.0 from 28 ratings. Comments are shown below: "These are amazing. I find it really hard to get from following every instruction to breaking it down so that they can adapt things to their own ideas. this does the job brilliantly." "Thanks so much, the resource is perfect for my new programmers."

This unit was written to provide homework, class assessments or additional tasks to complement your own database teaching. The theme of the two table database provided is Scottish golf club members and their competition results. There are five task sheets included as MS Word files: Task 1 – Analysis & Design – students must identify the information to be stored and then construct an entity relationship diagram and a data dictionary. Task 2 – SQL - 8 questions of varying difficulty based on SELECT, FROM, WHERE and AND Task 3 – SQL - a further 8 questions continuing from task 2 but adding ORDER BY Task 4 – SQL - 10 more SQL questions that require INSERT, DELETE and UPDATE Task 5 – Evaluation - compare the Scottish Golfers database against a set of requirements All marking instructions are provided. The above tasks were initially written as homework/assessment style questions (I spent 20 years writing questions for the Scottish exam system) but I have since created database files should you wish your students to code the SQL. The database files are provided in three formats for different environments: An Access file (two versions, a student version and one with the completed task 2 and 3 queries) CSV files that you can use to import the table data and build the database Text files that contain SQL CREATE and INSERT statements which you could use to create the database on a database server

Students are provided a scenario with four parallel arrays where each array stores the air pressure of a car tyre (front left, back right etc). Each question asks students to write code to solve a stated problem. Answers require that students write: find maximum - code that finds the largest value in an array find minimum - code that finds the smallest value in an array linear search - code that traverses an array looking for values count occurrence - code that count the number of times values are found in an array. The questions get progressively harder. Although many programming languages contain functions to carry out some or all of the above, knowing how to code these algorithms aids code understanding and gives students the ability to write alternative versions of each algorithm. Marking Instructions and a completed Python program with the solutions are supplied. The questions are suitable for any programming language your students may be familiar with. The marking instructions could be adapted for solutions in different languages. These could also be turned into practical tasks by providing a partial program that sets up the data in the arrays.