cim643

Syllabus — Front End Fundamentals

This is the main document for the CIM 443/643 course at University of Miami, Spring 2023.

🗓 Classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 3:30 PM to 4:45 PM.

Lecturer Email
Vinicius Sueiro vss43@miami.edu

This document is subject to change.

About the Course

This course focuses on job-ready skills and production workflow techniques in highest demand for front-end web developers. Students will learn, practice and demonstrate the skills and principles needed to make effective use of these technologies.

Course Goals

By the end of this course, students should be able to:

Course Topics

In order to reach the desired goals, students will learn concepts and techniques related to the 3 core technologies of the web (with an emphasis on the last one):

This course also covers tools that help us organize and scale up our projects:

Optionally:

All tools are free (or provide a free version), except Google Domains. 💸

Course Timeline

We will not learn everything at once. Instead, this course is split into a few steps. Each step builds on top of what we learned from the previous one. Here is what this progression looks like:

Presentation day

For each project, students will share their initial planning and their final website with classmates. Since there are 2 projects, this means that each student will present their work 4× during the semester.

In order to present, students need to sign-up for 5-min presentation slots (instructions will be provided via Blackboard).

Peer Feedback

During presentation days, each student must provide feedback to (→) at least 1 classmate, as illustrated below:

Animated diagram Animated diagram

How does it work?

After one student presents, the next student provides feedback.

After the last student presents, the first student provides feedback.

In essense, your feedback should be about your classmate’s project idea (conceptual) or its execution (technical), in the form of compliments, questions, or suggestions.

Course Content

The following tables describe what you are expected to do before class (“Preparation”), what we will do during class (“Content”), and what we have done during class (“Materials”).

Grading

I reserve the right to adjust the final grade according to class participation, attendance, overall quality of work, etc.

Grading Breakdown

Step Weight Assignment Task Points
Introduction 10 Points Expectations Submission 10
Project: Profile 40 Points Planning Presentation 10
Peer Feedback 5
Website Presentation 10
Peer Feedback 5
Submission 10
Project: Quiz 40 Points Website Presentation 15
Peer Feedback 10
Submission 15
Final Exam 10 Points Self-reflection Submission 10

Missed a task?

Late submissions via Blackboard will be accepted during the semester, but with a 10% grade deduction.

In case students miss an in-class presentation, they can still submit a video recording via Blackboard, also with a 10% grade deduction. However, the peer feedback points will be lost.

Grading Scale

Grade Points
A+ ≥ 97
A ≥ 93
A- ≥ 90
B+ ≥ 87
B ≥ 83
B- ≥ 80
C+ ≥ 77
C ≥ 70
D+ ≥ 65
D ≥ 60
F ≥ 0

Office Hours

Students are welcome to schedule individual sessions with the instructor. Please use Calendly to pick a specific time slot for our remote (Zoom) meeting. If you want to meet at another day, time, or place, please email your instructor to check availability.

Policies

Religious Holy Day Policy

It is the student’s obligation to provide faculty members with notice of the dates they will be absent for religious holy days. Students are responsible for material covered in class regardless of their presence. The University’s complete Religious Holy Day Policy can be found in the current Bulletin.

Attendance Policy

Class attendance is critical to the success of hands-on classes, including class participation in discussions and completion of in-class assignments. All students are responsible for material covered in the classroom regardless of their presence; therefore, check the class Blackboard for announcements, assignment requirements and due dates. Do not email your instructor to find out what has been posted to Blackboard.

Recording Policy

Students are expressly prohibited from recording any part of this course. If any recordings are available to students, they are intended to supplement the classroom experience. Students are expected to follow appropriate University policies and maintain the security of passwords used to access recorded lectures. Recordings may not be reproduced, shared with those not in the class, or uploaded to other online environments.

If the instructor or a University of Miami office plans any other uses for the recordings, beyond this class, students identifiable in the recordings will be notified to request consent prior to such use. Instructors are the copyright owner of the courseware; individual recordings of the materials on Blackboard and/or of the virtual sessions are not allowed; and that such materials cannot be shared outside the physical or virtual classroom environment.

Honor Code & Plagiarism Statements

Students enrolled in this course are expected to abide by the University of Miami Honor Code. The purpose of the Honor Code is to protect the academic integrity of the University by encouraging consistent ethical behavior in assigned coursework. Academic dishonesty of any kind, for whatever reason, will not be tolerated.

No honest student wants to be guilty of the intellectual crime of plagiarism, even unintentionally. Therefore, we provide you with these guidelines so that you don’t accidentally fall into the plagiarism trap.

Plagiarism is the taking of someone else’s words, work, or ideas, and passing them off as a product of your own efforts. Plagiarism may occur when a person fails to place quotation marks around someone else’s exact words, directly rephrasing or paraphrasing someone else’s words while still following the general form of the original, and/or failing to issue the proper citation to one’s source material.

In student papers, plagiarism is often due to:

The last item is probably the most common problem in student writing. It is still plagiarism if students use an author’s key phrases or sentences in a way that implies they are their own, even if they cite the source.

Well-Being Resources & Support

As you complete your coursework, consider how you can maintain your health and well-being as a top priority. To help you become familiar with the many programs and services available on campus, review the information collected on the Student Well-Being and Resiliency website available at miami.edu/well-being.

Please reach out to your instructor or any of the resources listed on the site if you need assistance or support throughout the semester.

Learn More

There is a lot of learning resources out there. This course does not intend to replace any of those. Instead, we heavily rely on them. Here are my top 3 free learning resources: