Contents
- Course Details
- Course Summary
- Course Timetable
- Course Aims
- Assumed Knowledge
- Course Learning Outcomes
- Teaching Rationale
- Teaching Strategies
- Student Conduct
- Special Consideration
- Assessment
- Course Schedule
- Resources for Students
- Course Evaluation and Development
Course Details
| Course Code | COMP9020 |
| Course Title | Foundations of Computer Science |
| Convenor | Paul Hunter |
| Admin | Paul Hunter |
| Classes |
Lectures
:
|
| Consultation |
Online consultations
|
| Units of Credit | 6 |
| Course Website | http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~cs9020 |
| Handbook Entry | http://www.handbook.unsw.edu.au/postgraduate/courses/current/COMP9020.html |
Course Summary
The official scope is: mathematical methods for designing correct and efficient programs; mathematics for algorithm analysis; logic for proving and verification.
The actual content is taken from a list of subjects that constitute the basis of the tool box of every serious practitioner of computing: set and relation theory; induction, recursion and recurrence relations; order of growth of functions; structured counting (combinatorics); discrete probability; graph theory and trees for algorithmic applications; propositional logic and boolean algebras.
Course Timetable
The course timetable is available here .
Course Aims
After successfully completing this course, you will have developed an increased level of mathematical maturity to assist with the fundamental problem of finding, formulating, and proving properties of programs.
Assumed Knowledge
None, though students should be comfortable with basic algebraic manipulation up to, and including, working with logarithms.
Course Learning Outcomes
After completing this course, students should:
Teaching Strategies
The learning focus for this course is on Lectures, Quizzes, Assignments and Problem Sets. There are no tutorials for this course, however the assessments (Quizzes and Assignments) and Problem Sets provide additional structured learning opportunities for students.
Lectures
Each week, two 2-hour lectures will introduce you to the concepts of the course, and use examples to show how these concepts are applied to solve problems.
Quizzes
Weekly (online) quizzes reinforce the concepts covered in lectures and provide feedback for students to self-assess progress on the first four Course Learning Outcomes. Each quiz should take 10-20 minutes, covers the material of the previous two lectures, and they are to be completed within 48 hours of the first lecture of the week.
Assignments
To assist in achieving the final two Course Learning Outcomes, there will be weekly formative assessment tasks, and two summative assignments where students solve a variety of problems. Formative tasks are worked on, with assistance from the teaching staff, to completion each week - with the difficulty of the tasks being self-selected by the students. The two summative assignments (due at the end of weeks 6 and 10) will enable students to solve problems with a larger scope, possibly involving concepts covered over several weeks.
Problem Sets
To assist with self-learning, practice questions and their solutions will be made available. While not assessed, discussion involving these questions with peers and teaching staff is encouraged.
Consultations
To aid with accessibility to teaching staff, there will be two weekly consultations (attendance is optional). These are intended to be student-driven - attendees are expected to participate.
Student Conduct
The Student Code of Conduct ( Information , Policy ) sets out what the University expects from students as members of the UNSW community. As well as the learning, teaching and research environment, the University aims to provide an environment that enables students to achieve their full potential and to provide an experience consistent with the University’s values and guiding principles. A condition of enrolment is that students inform themselves of the University’s rules and policies affecting them, and conduct themselves accordingly.
In particular, students have the responsibility to observe standards of equity and respect in dealing with every member of the University community. This applies to all activities on UNSW premises and all external activities related to study and research. This includes behaviour in person as well as behaviour on social media, for example Facebook groups set up for the purpose of discussing UNSW courses or course work. Behaviour that is considered in breach of the Student Code Policy as discriminatory, sexually inappropriate, bullying, harassing, invading another’s privacy or causing any person to fear for their personal safety is serious misconduct and can lead to severe penalties, including suspension or exclusion from UNSW.
If you have any concerns, you may raise them with your lecturer, or approach the School Ethics Officer , Grievance Officer , or one of the student representatives .
Plagiarism is defined as using the words or ideas of others and presenting them as your own. UNSW and CSE treat plagiarism as academic misconduct, which means that it carries penalties as severe as being excluded from further study at UNSW. There are several on-line sources to help you understand what plagiarism is and how it is dealt with at UNSW:
Make sure that you read and understand these. Ignorance is not accepted as an excuse for plagiarism. In particular, you are also responsible that your assignment files are not accessible by anyone but you by setting the correct permissions in your CSE directory and code repository, if using. Note also that plagiarism includes paying or asking another person to do a piece of work for you and then submitting it as your own work.
UNSW has an ongoing commitment to fostering a culture of learning informed by academic integrity. All UNSW staff and students have a responsibility to adhere to this principle of academic integrity. Plagiarism undermines academic integrity and is not tolerated at UNSW. Plagiarism at UNSW is defined as using the words or ideas of others and passing them off as your own.
If you haven't done so yet, please take the time to read the full text of
The pages below describe the policies and procedures in more detail:
You should also read the following page which describes your rights and responsibilities in the CSE context:
Special Consideration
If your work in this course is affected by unforeseen adverse circumstances, you should apply for Special Consideration through MyUNSW, including documentation on how your have been affected. If your request is reasonable and your work has clearly been impacted, then
- for an assignment, you may be granted an extension
- for the Final Exam, you may be offered a Supplementary Exam
Note the use of the word "may". None of the above is guaranteed. It depends on you making a convincing case that the circumstances have clearly impacted your ability to work.
If you are registered with Disability Services, please forward your documentation to Paul Hunter within the first two weeks of semester.
Assessment
The final mark is determined as the sum of the marks for the assessible components for this course:
-
60% exam, 30% assignments (summative and formative), 10% quizzes:
- 10 quizzes, worth up to 1.25 marks each
- Weekly formative assessment tasks, worth up to 10 marks in total
- 2 assignments [summative], worth 10 marks each
- a final exam worth 60 marks
Quizzes
Quizzes will be made available in inspera 48 hours before the first lecture of the week, and due at the start of the lecture. Your final overall grade for this component will be taken from your eight best quiz results.
Weekly formative tasks
The weekly assessment tasks will be made available via the formatif system. With formative assessments, the students are encouraged to complete the tasks to a satisfactory level with ongoing feedback and guidance from the teaching staff. At the end of term students construct a portfolio that reflects on their achievements. The final grade for this component will be determined by the quality and quantity of successfully completed tasks as demonstrated by this portfolio.
Summative assignments
There will be two assignments (due at the end of weeks 6 and 10), consisting of a variety of problems covering several topics. These will be marked against specific criteria in a marking guide and feedback will be provided via give . Students will have a minimum of two weeks to complete these assignments.
Final Exam
The final exam will be run through inspera . In order to pass the course, students must achieve a minimum of 40% in this component.
Please note the University's fit-to-sit policy - if you undertake an assessment then you are declaring yourself fit to do so. In particular, further supplementary assessments are not available to students that have sat the final exam.
Lateness Policy
- For quizzes and the final exam, no late submissions will be accepted.
- For the weekly formative tasks, students can request short extensions with no penalty, however student progress is monitored as part of the feedback system and repeated failure to submit work in a timely manner may result in incomplete tasks.
- For the two summative assessments, a lateness penalty of 5% per 24 hours (or part thereof) applies.
Course Schedule
The following is a tentative schedule of when topics will be covered.
| Week | Topic | Book chapters | Quiz | Assignment |
| 1 | Introduction to the course; Number theory |
[LLM]: 1, 8
|
|
|
| 2 | Sets and Languages | [RW]: 1 | Quiz 1 due |
|
|
3
|
Relations
|
[RW]: 3, 11
[LLM]: 4, 9, 13 |
Quiz 2 due |
|
|
4
|
Functions
|
[RW]: 3, 11
[LLM]: 4, 9, 13 |
Quiz 3 due | Assignment 1 available |
|
5
|
Graph theory |
[RW]: 6
[LLM]: 11, 12 |
Quiz 4 due |
|
|
6
|
Recursion; Algorithm analysis |
[RW]: 4, 7
[LLM]: 6, 21 |
Quiz 5 due |
Assignment 1 due
|
|
7
|
Induction |
[RW]: 4
[LLM]: 4, 6 |
Quiz 6 due |
|
| 8 | Logic |
[RW]: 10
[LLM]: 3 |
Quiz 7 due | Assignment 2 available |
| 9 |
Counting; Probability
|
[RW]: 5
[LLM]: 14 |
Quiz 8 due |
|
| 10 | Statistics; Revision |
[RW]: 9
[LLM]: 16, 17 |
Quiz 9 due | Assignment 2 due |
| 11 |
|
|
Quiz 10 due
|
|
Resources for Students
There is no compulsory textbook for this course, however, for more details on the topics covered in this course, it is recommended that students refer to the following books:
- [RW] KA Ross and CR Wright, Discrete Mathematics, 5th edition, Pearson, 2003.
- [LLM] E Lehman, FT Leighton and A Meyer, Mathematics for Computer Science, Creative Commons 2015.
[RW] has been the recommended textbook for the course for the last 10 or more years and covers the fundamentals well. [LLM] covers the advanced topics excellently and provides numerous examples rooted in Computer Science.
Course Evaluation and Development
This course is evaluated each session using the myExperience system to obtain feedback on the quality of the various course components. Your participation in the survey will be greatly appreciated. Students are also encouraged to provide informal feedback during the session, and to notify the lecturer-in-charge of any problems as soon as they arise.
Student feedback from last offerings indicated that students were very satisfied with the course, but expressed an interest in more feedback from assignments, quizzes and exercises. Students also requested more worked examples in lectures, which we will endeavour to include in this offering.Resource created Thursday 18 May 2023, 06:12:41 AM, last modified Saturday 17 June 2023, 11:22:15 PM.