Classroom environment for programmers

[Marts]

I’m wondering if anyone has setup a classroom environment for programming.

 

I was thinking about a virtual desktop solution to provide each of student with a desktop to run .exe etc but others around me have suggested RDS (remote desktop services or terminal services)?

Does anyone have experience of running either of these two setups for classroom for KS2/3 students learning how to do ICT programming?

 

 

Cheers

Marts

[jonawd]

I think that would partly depend on the type of programming you were doing and how it needed to be tested.

What kind of programming are you planning on doing?

[synaesthesia]

We're using virtualbox to provide an immutable image to each workstation (it's local to each machine) for this purpose. The students get as close to a real-life experience as possible on an unlimited machine.

[Jonah]

We're doing very similar but with App Controller, gives the added benefit of a persistent state for the students machines regardless of where they log in, so work can e saved/continued in future lessons.

[Marts]

helpful suggestions! I'm going to go away and work over a few of these ideas. I'll post back on my findings. Many thanks x)

[madurham]

If you do use Virtualbox, have a read through this really helpful thread: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/how-do-you-do/95325-virtualbox-image-programming-classes.html

[fiza]

We're using virtualbox to provide an immutable image to each workstation (it's local to each machine) for this purpose. The students get as close to a real-life experience as possible on an unlimited machine.

 

+1 for this. Following guidance on Edugeek I set it all up ready for Sept. Will see what everyone makes of it in a few weeks time.