Final Exam Information

Material covered

The exam will cover the entire semester. It will only include topics that we covered in lecture and/or on the assignments. Picobot will not be on the exam.

Exam details

• The exam will be held on Thursday, May 10, from 9-11 a.m., in the following locations:

  • A1 lecture (MWF 10:10-11:00):
    • students with last names A-T: Law Auditorium
    • students with last names U-Z: CAS 522
  • B1 lecture (MWF 11:15-12:05): Law Auditorium
  • C1 lecture (MWF 12:20-1:10):
    • students with last names A-P: CAS 522
    • students with last names Q-Z: CAS 224
  • students with special accommodations: MCS B23

• You must bring your BU ID to the exam, and have it verified when you turn in the exam.

• The exam will consist of three parts:

  • Part I will contain multiple-choice questions that you must complete. For each multiple-choice question, you will be able to specify up to two answers. Each question will be worth 3 points, and you will get 1 point for any problem in which your first choice is wrong but your second choice is correct. There is no penalty for specifying a wrong second choice.

  • Part II will consist of several multi-part problems. The individual parts of each problem will be similar in format and difficulty to the problems on the midterms. You will have some choice in this section (e.g., complete 3 out of 4 problems, or 4 out of 5).

  • Part III will consist of a single multi-part problem that you must complete. Parts of this problem may require a bit more work than the typical midterm problem, but they will still be doable in the time available.

• You will have two hours to complete the exam. The questions will be worth a total of 100 points. You should plan on spending approximately one minute per point.

• You may use one 3-inch by 5-inch index card with handwritten notes (both sides). However, you must use a card that we provide. These cards will be distributed in lecture. If you aren’t able to get one in lecture, they will be available in the CS office (MCS 138) beginning on the first day of study period. Please turn your card in with your exam.

• We will provide a page with the full list of Hmmm instructions that you can use during the exam.

• You may not use any electronic devices during the exam.

• You may not leave the exam room and return, so please use the restroom before the exam.

Preparing for the exam

• One way to prepare is to review the lecture notes, lecture videos, and assignments, and to make a summary of the key points in your own words. “Boiling down” the material in this way is a great way to ensure that you really understand the key concepts.

• We also encourage you to do practice problems. Options include:

  • redoing the questions posed in lecture–both the Top Hat questions and the open-response ones. The online lecture notes include both the questions and–on the next page–the answers.

  • the practice problems for midterm 1 and midterm 2

  • the following sets of additional practice problems:

    • first set: practice problems on references, 2-D lists, object-oriented programming, and FSMs

    • second set - practice problems on a variety of topics from throughout the semester

  When working on practice problems, try to come up with your answers on paper, rather than through a trial-and-error approach on IDLE or in another programming environment. This will be give you an experience that is similar to the one that you have during the exam.

• Feel free to post questions on Piazza (using the final_exam tag) or to email the course account (cs111-staff@cs.bu.edu).