Day 7: Program Investigation and Requirements

Learning Objectives

• CRD-2.F: Design a program and its user interface.

Essential Questions

• How do developers determine what users need in a program?
• What techniques can be used to gather and document program requirements?

Materials Needed

• Presentation slides on requirements gathering
• User interview templates
• Requirements specification templates
• Sample user personas
• Sticky notes and chart paper

Vocabulary

• Requirements
• User needs
• User persona
• Use case
• User story
• Functional requirements
• Non-functional requirements

Procedure (50 minutes)

Opening (8 minutes)

1. Review and Connection (3 minutes)

   • Review development processes from previous lesson
   • Connect to today's focus on the investigation phase

2. Warm-up Discussion (5 minutes)

   • Prompt: "How do developers know what to build?"
   • Discuss challenges of understanding user needs

Main Activities (32 minutes)

3. Lecture: Investigating Program Requirements (10 minutes)

   • Explain the importance of requirements gathering
   • Discuss different types of requirements:
     • Functional requirements (what the program must do)
     • Non-functional requirements (performance, usability, security)
   • Introduce techniques for understanding user needs:
     • User personas and scenarios
     • Use cases
     • User stories ("As a ___, I want to ___ so that ___")

4. Workshop: Methods for Gathering Requirements (12 minutes)

   • Present different requirements gathering methods:
     • Surveys and questionnaires
     • User interviews
     • Observation
     • Competitive analysis
   • Demonstrate effective interview techniques:
     • Open-ended questions
     • Follow-up questions
     • Avoiding leading questions
   • Show examples of well-documented requirements

5. Activity: Mini User Interviews (10 minutes)

   • Students pair up and take turns as "developer" and "user"
   • Each "developer" conducts a 4-minute interview about a simple app idea
     (e.g., study planner, event organizer, fitness tracker)
   • "Developers" take notes on requirements
   • Switch roles and repeat

Closing (10 minutes)

6. Create Program Specification (7 minutes)

   • Based on their user interview, students create a simple program specification including:
     • Program purpose
     • Target users
     • Key functional requirements (3-5)
     • Key non-functional requirements (2-3)
     • Constraints or limitations

7. Preview Next Lesson (3 minutes)

   • Explain that next class will focus on program design techniques
   • Ask students to think about how requirements translate into design

Assessment

• Formative: Quality of user interview questions and technique
• Program Specification: Completeness and clarity of requirements documentation

Differentiation

For Advanced Students

• Create more complex user personas with detailed needs
• Develop requirements for programs with multiple user types

For Struggling Students

• Provide structured templates for interviews and requirements
• Offer simplified app scenarios with clearer user needs

Homework/Extension

• Conduct a brief requirements gathering interview with a friend or family member
• Create a detailed user persona for your program idea
• Research how a popular app evolved based on user feedback

Teacher Notes

• Emphasize that understanding user needs is critical to program success
• Connect requirements gathering to collaboration skills from Week 1
• Point out that many program failures stem from poor requirements understanding
• Remind students that requirements will inform their design in the next lesson