Introduction to FEU2

Introduction to FEU2

Welcome to the second year of front-end development at Noroff. You’ve certainly come a long way and we hope you’re looking forward to getting even more familiar with front-end development and learn important technologies that are going to help you get a job in the industry.

The subjects to look forward to this year include:

• CSS Frameworks
• JavaScript 2
• Workflow
• Semester Project 2
• Industry Knowledge
• Development Platforms
• JavaScript Frameworks
• Portfolio 2
• Project Exam 2

Changes to the CMS

The Content Management System, where this lesson is hosted, has changed from what you had previously. Front-end Development is trialling the new system for managing content, and we’re hopeful that it will improve your user experience. One of the main bonuses from a student perspective is the ability to search through content, and from a teacher’s perspective, we’ll have direct access to the content to keep it up-to-date.

Changes to the LMS

You’ve probably noticed some changes to the LMS, Moodle. It has been re-worked to better group subjects together, so you have one place for the links to content and deliveries, rather than having the content in one place and the deliveries in another.

Assessment as Learning

In the field of pedagogy, there is growing support for what is termed ‘Assessment as Learning’ and what it emphasises is the importance of feedback, but importantly that the feedback should be given during the learning and not after the learning has happened. You’re likely to have experienced this in your first year where you received feedback on a CA and wish you’d known that before the delivery.

Tutor feedback

To follow the principle of ‘Assessment as Learning’ we’re going to ask students to request feedback from a tutor before delivery. You can then use this feedback to make adjustments to your delivery before you hand in the CA. When you ask for feedback it’s a good idea to tell the tutor what you’d like feedback on. Rather than “can you spot any issues?” ask “I solved an issue I had by doing x, do you think that was the best way of solving that problem?”

Peer feedback

Another measure we’re implementing is peer feedback, and for this, you’ll be required to ask for feedback as well as give feedback to fellow students.

There are two main reasons we’re doing this:

• To increase the amount of feedback you’ve received before you deliver the CA
• To improve your ability to read code and give feedback to other developers as you would in the real world

A common request we’ve gotten is to add more collaboration to the programme, and although you’ll still be working on your own projects, hopefully, this formalised system of looking at each other’s code will help you all become better developers.

Access to the whole course

Another change we’re implementing is access to the whole course at once. Previously, you would have received a module every week, but the issue we kept having is if students had a busy week they’d fall behind in a module, but equally, if they had a free week they couldn’t read ahead and finish extra modules.

It also develops a key skill in increasing your agency for your studies.

Questions and feedback?

If you have any questions or feedback you’d like to give us about these changes, please let us know. We want the best solution for students and we are open to ideas of how we can achieve that. Especially with the CMS, we’re hoping that it can be rolled out to other programmes, so any suggestions there would be appreciated.