Student Spotlight
The SJSU First-Year Writing Program's Digital Literacy Showcase
Date and Time: April 25, 2025 from 2:00-4:00PM
Location: Digital Humanities Center, MLK Library, San José State University
Please RSVP to attend the showcase event!
Sponsored by: Adobe Systems, SJSU's College of Humanities & the Arts, SJSU's Department of English, SJSU's Digital Humanities Center, SJSU's Office of the Provost, and SJSU's Office of Research.
Students of Professor Esperanza Huerta Espinosa created podcasts as an alternative to writing essays in their business class. Here are two of the student podcasts produced using Adobe Audition.
Listen to or download the podcast, "Programming for Beginners"
- Read the transcript to "Programming for Beginners"
-
Welcome back to talks with CHC, where we may end
up talking until the sun sets.
Hi, everyone, it's CHC. Today we'll be talking
about what you should do to be successful in a
programming course for beginners. When I first
started programming, I struggled a lot.
And because of that, I can tell you it's not
something that came easy to me. Now that I'm a more
seasoned programmer, let me tell you about what
you should do to succeed. To start, read the
textbook. Yeah, I know it might not be fun, but
you have to read that textbook more than once.
Read it two times once before your class and once
more after. Before you go to class, not only should
you read the textbook, but you need to take notes
on the important concepts that stick out to you,
whether that be an actual concept, a function or
command or a definition of a term. It helps to
actually type or write things out because it tends
to stick with you more than if you were to just
read the textbook. After you write those notes,
take it to class and add what is being taught in
class to your notes. After class, review your notes
and open the textbook to read again. When you do this, things start
to come together now that you've heard and seen
everything at least three times. Once you start
getting more interactive with the content, you
begin to learn more. In addition to reading a
textbook and taking notes, find practice problems. If
your textbook doesn't offer anything, go on to
Reddit.com and find practice problems on a subreddit
called r/programming help. There are no spaces.
Here they don't offer you complete practice
problems, but there are people who post about
needing help with their code. You can get practice
by attempting to solve their code, by doing it
yourself and then checking if you've done it right,
by reading the solutions that are offered in the
comments. Similarly, you can go on to stack overflow
and do the same thing. Just browse
through the post and click on a problem that
interests you and relate to the programming that
you are learning. Practice is everything. Using
these websites will give you the opportunity to
read and practice solving other people's codes, as
well as learn from their mistakes and avoid doing
what they did yourself. Finally, the last advice
that I have to give you is to use YouTube. It's an
amazing source for students. You get people all
around the world teaching you how to program. If
one person's teaching style doesn't match yours,
then you can easily find another. On YouTube, you
can pause and replay things at any time. This can
give you a chance to catch up on your notetaking
and have some time to completely understand the
concepts being taught. Just search up the concepts
you're having trouble with and then browse through
the videos to find the one that will help you the
most. The video that will work for each person is
different because everyone has different problems
and a different way of understanding things.
Because of that, I won't go into too much detail
about who to watch and what to watch. And it looks
like time is up so and my advice giving here.
Don't be discouraged if you don't succeed in
coding right off the bat, programming is difficult.
You might run into a lot of problems as you go
through your programming course. But keep in mind
that there are a lot of ways you can mitigate
those hardships. Remember, read your textbook and
take notes. Use online resources like Reddit,
StackOverflow and YouTube and most importantly,
practice, practice, practice. Following these
tests will help you succeed in your programming
course, just as it did for me. I wish you the best
of luck and I'll see you next time. Bye.
Disclaimer, all of the sound effects and
background music are not mine. All sound effects
are from freesound.org and the background music is
from pixabay.com, who's part of these websites for
the Rights and Licencing. Thank you.
-
Download the transcript to the podcast, "Programming for Beginners".
Listen to or download the podcast, "Things to Know at the Start of the Semester"
- Read the transcript to the podcast, "Things to Know at the Start of the Semester"
-
Welcome to my podcast in which I'm going to talk
about what I wish I had known at the beginning of
this semester.
The beginning of a semester can be an uneasy time
There are students trying to crash and add courses
in order to fill out their schedule and graduate
on time. Students trying to figure out if the classes they are in,
are the right fit for them and much more
anxiety than necessary for college age kids. I
remember the beginning of this semester. It was no
different for me. I was not worried about having to
crash or add any courses, but I was nervous that
certain courses I enrolled in would prove to be
too difficult for me. With this being my last
semester, that possibility frightened me to my
core because it would mean I didn't graduate on
time. One of the courses I was especially nervous
about was Business-one-120G. I had ended up enrolling
in this course because I needed another accounting
elective. Due to the pandemic, the options are
limited. Because of the limited options, I seemingly
chose at random and decided on Bus-one-120G. I was
not even sure what the class was at the time. All
I was concerned with was that it would satisfy the
elective requirement I needed. The first day of
class, I finally learned with the class I had
enrolled in really was programming and systems
development and AIS. I quickly learned that this was
essentially an introductory course to programming which I
knew nothing about and never thought I would
know anything about. I found myself filled with
nerves that the course would be too difficult for
me since it was such a foreign concept. Having now
almost completed the semester, there are a few
things I wish I could have told to my past self in
order to help prepare me for what's to come. First
off, I would have tried to explain what the class was as
opposed to going into it, not knowing anything.
I would have also tried to express how important it is
to, "eat your vegetables". Lastly, I would
have liked to tell myself about the effectiveness
of the trial and error method when writing a
program.
It is usually not a good idea to get involved with
something before knowing exactly what it is you're
getting involved with. The same rule applies to
choosing what courses to take. At the time of
choosing courses, I was blinded by the light at
graduation and did not bother to learn what the
courses were, which I was choosing. Because of
this, the first couple of class meetings were very
intimidating. I wish I could have told myself that,
yes, the courses will teach you how to write
programs, but it will do so at a manageable pace.
What I would have also said was that this course is
specifically for business students, and it is
likely that not many others in the class have
prior programming knowledge either. I remember
thinking what a great mistake I had made picking
this course and how I felt I did not belong in the
class. I believe that knowing what the course was
going to be, knowing I was not the only one
without prior knowledge and understanding that the
course was designed for students like me would have
not only helped me prepare for this course, but would have
also helped ease my nerves in those first few
weeks. Another piece of advice I would have liked
to tell myself at the beginning of the semester is
the importance of eating your vegetables.
Professor Huerta does not make practice
programs mandatory. Instead, she encourages students to
complete them for their own sake as opposed to for
the sake of grade. Huerta uses the analogy of
eating your vegetables to explain this importance.
People don't usually like to eat their vegetables,
but is very important to do so to ensure that
you're getting the nutrients needed. Doing the
practice problems is very similar to that.
Students don't often want to do extra work if it
is not required for grade, but doing so here is
very important to fully understand the material
and pass the course. I believe that had I actually
understood this lesson, I would have completed
more and more of the practice problems and would
have had a much better understanding in the course
and a better grade than I do now. The last thing
that I wish I could have told myself at the
beginning of the semester is how effective the
trial and error method is to writing and solving
programs. During the first few weeks of programming,
I felt like a fish on a bicycle, completely unsure
about so many aspects of what I was trying to do.
One of the things I discovered later in the
semester that helped me a lot with writing
programs was how helpful trial and error was in
getting a program to do what I wanted to do. This
involves making small changes to programs and then
attempting to run them and doing so over and over
again until the desired output was given. Once I
learned the trial and error method, I began to
succeed at a much higher rate in writing programs
and I would advise any new programmers to use this
method.
Had I known all of these things at the beginning
of the semester, I believe that I would have been
a much more successful student in this class than I
actually have been.
Thank you for listening to my podcast. Don't
forget to like and subscribe down below.
Good bye.
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Download the transcript to the podcast, "Things to Know at the Start of the Semester".
Students of Lecturer Laura Guardino produced podcasts examining the significance and influence of sources in the study of history. Here is one of the student podcasts:
Listen to or download the podcast, "Examining Sources in HIstory"
- Read the transcript to the podcast, "Examining Sources in History"
-
For this podcast, we will be discussing
Nathaniel Bacons Declaration of the People, a
document issued in response to Governor Berkeley in
the midst of Bacon's rebellion. It is important to
understand the purpose of this document. Nathaniel
Bacon's Declaration of the People was a list of
complaints issued by Nathaniel Bacon on July 30th,
1676, in which he accused Virginia's colonial
governor, Sir William Berkeley, his cousin, of
being corrupt, playing favorites and protecting
the Indians for his own self-interest. Now,
what Bacon was trying to get across here is that,
Here are our list of reasons for rebelling
against you. He specifically mentions imposing
unfair taxation, having neglected to promote trade,
putting unqualified people in positions of
government, and having failed to protect the
colony from Indian attacks. The message that Bacon
gives in his declaration is explicit because he
directly expressed his reasons for rebelling
against Berkeley in the colonial government. For
example, the first reason Bacon gives for rebelling is
that, he says, for having a conspicuous pretends
of public works raised great, unjust taxes upon
the commodity for the advancement of
private favorites. Basically, what Bacon is
saying here is that Berkeley raised taxes for the
colonies for his own self benefits at the expense
of the people in the colony. Now, to conclude,
this uprising was one of the earliest major
popular rebellions against British colonial rule
in the Americas.
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Download the transcript to the podcast, Examining Sources in History.
The SJSU 2022 Adobe XD Challenge for students was named Turtle Hurtle. For this creative contest, students were challenged to create a climate game or app to educate and inform about disaster risk reduction and what to do in the event of a natural disaster. Students could choose from one of many climate disasters. The game or app teaches about climate change through engaging, interactive, and science-based gaming experiences!
This SJSU Adobe student activity was produced by Tina Korani, Assistant Professor of Media Design, Co-founder of Immersive Storytelling Lab in the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at San Jose State University.
View presentations of the outstanding student projects on YouTube using the links below.
