Comments on: Teaching video games programming Fabrice, you're doing your students a great service IMHO. You're giving them the confidence to try their own ideas and the willingness to risk failure, which can lead to understanding and growth, instead of getting stuck in analysis paralysis. Keep on rocking on! Fabrice, you’re doing your students a great service IMHO. You’re giving them the confidence to try their own ideas and the willingness to risk failure, which can lead to understanding and growth, instead of getting stuck in analysis paralysis. Keep on rocking on!

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By: Bjoern Knafla/2011/02/04/teaching-video-games-programming/#comment-412 Bjoern Knafla Tue, 08 Feb 2011 13:52:57 +0000 Thanks for your comments!LloydToDestroy: the only real course material I have is about setting up visual C++ projects and using SVN, everything else is practice. I usually start a new exercise by describing some simple game, then I start putting together core components (so there is a least some common ground between the students' programs) and at the same time I introduce a few new language concepts, and I finally brief the students about what is left to do. From there I let them continue on their own and I go from student to student to check how it goes. If they are stuck, I start hinting at what should be undertaken next, and usually after a few minutes I can see them starting to write code. Then I just go from one raised hand to the other and I answer their questions until most of them seem to get stuck again. Then I rinse and repeat.Some of the exercises we have done so far include clones of Bejewelled and Arkanoid, a 2D physics sandbox, a maze, a 3D terrain generator, and a 2D particle system. But we are only half-way through the year, and the other teachers are also doing some more games with them, so this is only a representative sample.lysinewf: I have been too often floored to hear condescending remarks from people who don't work in the games industry and consider it to be sub-par with other applications of CS. I used to react strongly to this, but now I just stopped caring. Ignorance is curable, stupidity is forever.Bjoern Knafla: I try as much a possible to confront them with problems they can overcome with the knowledge at their disposal, but sometimes the solution it leads them to is tedious. This way, when I later introduce a more efficient way of dealing with it they can better understand the benefits.But it is true I would progress a lot faster I wasn't taking this kind of approach. Especially now that they learned the basics their questions are more and more specific and require longer explanations, and since their autonomy leads them all in different directions I spend most of my courses nowadays going from one to the other. But when I am not available for the group as a whole, there are students who keep on trying stuff on their own (hopefully the majority), and some others start to slack off. But this is a generic problem with teaching I guess, despite some success I still have a lot to learn in this regard. Thanks for your comments!LloydToDestroy: the only real course material I have is about setting up visual C++ projects and using SVN, everything else is practice. I usually start a new exercise by describing some simple game, then I start putting together core components (so there is a least some common ground between the students’ programs) and at the same time I introduce a few new language concepts, and I finally brief the students about what is left to do. From there I let them continue on their own and I go from student to student to check how it goes. If they are stuck, I start hinting at what should be undertaken next, and usually after a few minutes I can see them starting to write code. Then I just go from one raised hand to the other and I answer their questions until most of them seem to get stuck again. Then I rinse and repeat.Some of the exercises we have done so far include clones of Bejewelled and Arkanoid, a 2D physics sandbox, a maze, a 3D terrain generator, and a 2D particle system. But we are only half-way through the year, and the other teachers are also doing some more games with them, so this is only a representative sample.lysinewf: I have been too often floored to hear condescending remarks from people who don’t work in the games industry and consider it to be sub-par with other applications of CS. I used to react strongly to this, but now I just stopped caring. Ignorance is curable, stupidity is forever.Bjoern Knafla: I try as much a possible to confront them with problems they can overcome with the knowledge at their disposal, but sometimes the solution it leads them to is tedious. This way, when I later introduce a more efficient way of dealing with it they can better understand the benefits.But it is true I would progress a lot faster I wasn’t taking this kind of approach. Especially now that they learned the basics their questions are more and more specific and require longer explanations, and since their autonomy leads them all in different directions I spend most of my courses nowadays going from one to the other. But when I am not available for the group as a whole, there are students who keep on trying stuff on their own (hopefully the majority), and some others start to slack off. But this is a generic problem with teaching I guess, despite some success I still have a lot to learn in this regard.

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By: Bjoern Knafla/2011/02/04/teaching-video-games-programming/#comment-410 Bjoern Knafla Sat, 05 Feb 2011 23:11:07 +0000 If only we could all be so lucky to have teachers who cared that much about their craft. My first CS professor looked at me with disdain when I said I made games. He had just quit his game job to pursue teaching... lol! If only we could all be so lucky to have teachers who cared that much about their craft. My first CS professor looked at me with disdain when I said I made games. He had just quit his game job to pursue teaching… lol!

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By: LloydToDestroy/2011/02/04/teaching-video-games-programming/#comment-408 LloydToDestroy Fri, 04 Feb 2011 18:58:53 +0000