Towards Teaching Software Craftsmanship

Abstract

We report on the experience of the first offering of the course, "The Craft of Software Development." The purpose of the course is to identify and remediate individual weaknesses as software developers. Each student was asked to pick a personal learning focus in an area of known software development weakness for that student. Through a "maiden speech" they asked their class community for help in creating a learning plan to address their area of weakness. Learning plans typically incorporated known apprenticeship patterns such as "Find a Coach," "Breakable Toys," and "Practice, Practice, Practice." After creating their learning plan, students identified metrics to track their progress towards their goal. While executing their individual learning plans, the class performed programming katas which are specific programming exercises to work on issues relevant for the entire class. Several issues emerged in the first offering in the course and several suggestions are provided for incorporation in the next offering of the course.