CSC290 Communication Skills for Computer Scientists (Fall 2019)

Course Description

Targeted instruction and significant practice in the communications required for careers in computer science. The curriculum covers written, oral and interpersonal communication. Students will hand in short pieces of writing each week, will make oral presentations several times in the semester, and will work together in simulated project meetings and other realistic scenarios of pair and small group interaction. This can be used to satisfy the writing requirement in CSC programs.

Syllabus for: LEC0101 LEC0102

All announcements will be made on the course message board.

Course Staff

Instructor: Lisa Zhang
Office Hours: WF 11am-12pm
Office: DH3078
Email: lczhang [at] cs [dot] toronto [dot] edu
Please include "CSC290" in your email subject.

Tentative Schedule

	Date	Material	Reading	Deadline
Week 1	Sep 9	Lecture: Introduction Communication Theory: Writing for your audience Slides Worksheet Tutorial (Sep 10/13): Networking Slides Worksheet	Lecture Reading: Undervalued Software Engineering Skills: Writing Well Required Reading: The Transition from High School to University Writing Writing is Thinking	Blog (Sep 15)
Week 2	Sep 16	Lecture: Critical Thinking Slides Worksheet Tutorial: Reading a Paper Slides Worksheet Office Hours Cancelled on Friday Sep 20th	Tutorial Reading: How to Read a Paper Required Reading Hit Parades of Errors in Grammar, Punctuation, and Style	Blog (Sep 22)
Week 3	Sep 23	Lecture: Project Management Slides Worksheet Tutorial: The Critical Review Slides Critical Review Samples Rubric	Recommended Reading Why Software Fails	Blog (Sep 29)
Week 4	Sep 30	Lecture: Interpersonal Communication Technical Writing 1 Slides Worksheet Technical Writing Samples Notes on the Writing Samples RGASC Drop In for Critical Review October 3rd 1pm-4pm North Building 3rd Floor Tutorial: Group Work and Team Formation This is a required tutorial (5% penalty on the Project Plan if you do not attend) Slides Project Plan Handout	Required The Pragmatic Programmer, Chapter 1 (on Quercus) The Elements of Style Recommended Purdue OWL IEEE In-text Citation (IEEE and ACM citation formats are similar. You can use the in-text citation guidelines in this link.)	Critical Review (Oct 6)
Week 5	Oct 7	Lecture: Presentation Skills Slides Worksheet Tutorial: Technical Writing: Git, Github, Markdown Slides		Project Plan (Oct 13)
Reading week, no class / tutorial			Ten Great Books	Blog (Oct 20) Presentation Slides (due Oct 21, 11pm)
Week 6	Oct 21	Lecture: Clean Code Slides Code Samples Tutorial: Design Review Presentations	Required How to write a git commit message Code Complete 2nd Edition, chapter 11 and 32 (see Quercus) Recommended Software Engineering at Google	Code Commit (Oct 27)
Week 7	Oct 28	Lecture: Technical Writing 2 Revising and Editing Slides Excerpts Tutorial: Design Review Presentations (Required)		Critical Review Edits (~~Nov 3~~ TBD)
Week 8	Nov 4	Lecture: Midterm Tutorial: Revising the Critical Review Slides		Documentation (Nov 10)
Week 9	Nov 11	Lecture: Email Slides Email Samples Tutorial: Time for Group Work		Final Presentation Slides
Week 10	Nov 18	Lecture: Interpersonal Scenarios Presentation Preparation Slides Tutorial: Final Presentations		Blog (Nov 24)
Week 11	Nov 25	Lecture Activities: Resume & Cover Letter Slides Tutorial: Final Presentations (Required)	Required Reading: Sample Job Postings (UTM Career Center) Resume Content Builder (UTM Career Center)	Blog (Dec 1)
Week 12	Dec 2	Lecture Activities: Technical Interviews Slides Follow-up		Project Repository (Dec 4)
Final Examinations You can find old csc290 exams here. Keep in mind that the content covered each term may be different.