Some questions for the Computational and Learning Questionnaire
Mood:  a-ok
Now Playing: Put your head on my shoulders (Paul Anka)
Topic: Questionnaire
James and Doug basically made me scrapped my two dimensional questionnaire, because it is going to be difficult to find relationships if the two dimensions don't correlate (there were some more arguments :D). Anyway, they probably know what's best - especially since this is a one year project - must make it as simple as possible - probably for the Ph.D can revisit that. Well, actually they did say that, probably, in this year find some foundation for those two dimensions and that type of questionnaire would become more meaningful.

So, James and Doug wants me to create some questions for the questionnaire by the 21st and not to worry about dimensions and scales!!! Sheesh ... suddenly realized how close that is, because the truth is I'll have to create it somewhere around the 17th so, I can send it off with the agenda, but I have DTZY840 due on the 18th.

Anyway, not sure what kind of questions to ask as yet. I have to find some questions that characterize the software and I am not sure if they should be yes/no or scaled questions. Let me think of some of the questions I can have related to the formulation of the problem:

1. Are students required to know how to formulate linear programming questions? (I wonder if giving an importance scale might be better - or something along AHP).

2. Is the formulation done by paper and pen or in the computer?
(I think I am going off track, the questions have to relate to defining computational and learning software - I am getting lost!)

Let me try some questions along the line of computation:

1. Are you aware if your software allows you to display the tableaus?

2. Are you able to choose the pivot row and variable without prompting from the software? (Was looking up on the net and see some people refer to it as the pivot element rather than variable and some just say the entering variable or basic variable)

3. Do you use the software to find the solution for the linear programming problem? (you see this is why I think there should be some scale - since everyone is going to use the software for some solution - yeah but thinking if there is only one yes to a list of questions then obviously using computational).

4. What algorithm is taught to students for using the software? (I am hoping it is simplex algorithm and nothing like interior-point or not only the network problems!)

5. What method are used for learning the simplex algorithm? (Using tableaus or matrices ... obviously can only answer this question if the previous one is answered simplex algorithm)

I think some practical course questions are also needed:

1. For how long is linear programming taught for in the course?
(Guess this can be a scale like 2 hrs, 8 hrs, 20 hrs - this will vary depending on the type of course I think).

2. What is the software used in conjunction with linear programming (if any)? (Not sure if I should provide a list or ask them to write it down.)

3. Are students provided with a workshop/ computer session for familiarization of the software? (Well, guess they should - unless it is some kind of TI calculator which they may be familiar with)

4. Is there a linear programming project associated with the course to use the software? (Not sure how useful this is - but in UWI students did this).

5. For which students is the course geared to? (I'm thinking maths, business and engineering - but there is also OR, agriculture, engineering management, business management, industrial engineering and economics that might have various levels).

6. Which department is the course based in? (Some courses although a business course could be taught by the math department - I'm thinking the math dept might influence the business style of course - guess that is where I can throw in some factor analysis - or the very least loglinear or logistic regression).

You know I am thinking, probably should make this a scorecard, like the first half positive towards learning software, so if answered yes, then add those points up, and the second half to computational software and if answered no, then those become points to add. A high score means using the software in a more learning basis. I will need to mix the questions up to ensure validity and reliability of the questionnaire.