Study of “data structure and algorithm design” teaching reform based on CDIO model

CDIO is a new and innovative engineering education model. This model emphasizes that engineering education should focus on practice and training high-level engineers as a goal. “Data structure and algorithm design” is an important theory and technology course for computer-related professionals. However, traditional teaching only focuses on the theory, and the scores are just determined by the final examination papers. In this mode, students have no interest and can not apply their knowledge to solve practical problems, thus the teaching effectiveness is very poor. This paper applies the CDIO concept to “Data structure and algorithm design”, and then shows the innovative achievements. In this paper, teaching reform based on CDIO approach is performed from three aspects: firstly, reform the course syllabus of “Data structure and algorithm design”, increase the proportion of practice from 20% to 30%, in order to strengthen the students’ practical ability. Secondly, reform the curriculum contents. Join some projects to the process of teaching, and introduce this combining idea to both the teaching process and practice process. For instance, the chapter “tree” is a key section of this course, here we design a project of “association rules mining in telecommunication networks” to practice how to build a tree structure and use this structure to resolve everyday life problems. This idea of reform can not only help the students consolidate knowledge learning, but also can train the students’ hands-on innovation and practice ability. Thirdly, reform the assessment methods. In this paper, the AHP situation assessment is proposed to calculate scores scientifically. In the AHP model, student's initiative, innovation and other factors such as final exam scores should be considered as assessment criteria of analytic hierarchy process established. With the AHP model, scientific and reasonable scores can finally be given. Teaching experiments prove that the method of combining teaching and project, using AHP model to test results can effectively mobilize the enthusiasm of students, finally achieve good effectiveness of teaching.