Computer Science Principles

CS Principles was written using the AP CS Principles Framework and prepares students for the AP CS Principles exam. The curriculum has also been aligned to the newly revised 2017 CSTA standards. A summary of standards mappings can be found here. A google sheet version of the standards can be found at CSP Standards.

Our curriculum and platform are available at no cost for anyone, anywhere, to teach!

Our Professional Learning Program offers year-round support. The program kicks off with a 5-day summer workshop where you'll have an opportunity to work hands-on with the curriculum and meet other teachers from your area. Throughout the year, we offer forum support and follow-up workshops. You don't need any prior computer science experience to get started. And teachers love it! 90% rank it the best professional development ever. Click here to apply and learn more.

Have questions about professional development? Provide your contact information to a Regional Partner in your area.

We recommend that CS Principles be taught as a full year class, assuming that you meet with students daily or nearly daily for 45 or more minutes.

It is possible to teach CS Principles on a semester block schedule, though we highly recommend this implementation only be used in the fall semester. Since the AP Performance Tasks are due in late April and require 20 dedicated hours of class time to complete, most schools find there is not enough time to complete the course on a block schedule in the spring.

Required Materials: CS Principles requires that students have access to computers with a modern web browser. At this time, our courses are not optimized for tablets or mobile devices. For more details, check out Code.org's technology requirements.

Many lessons have handouts that are designed to guide students through activities. While these handouts are not required, we highly recommend their use. In addition to handouts, several lessons call for specific items. You can find these listed below as well as our suggestions for alternatives:

• Unit 1, Lesson 2: Assortment of craft materials for constructing physical devices. Recommendations: cups, string/yarn, construction paper, flashlights, slinkies, noise makers, markers, and glue, etc. Alternative: none.
• Unit 2, Lesson 2: String for table groups to build a network connecting them. Alternative: Students draw their network but don't actually build it.
• Unit 3, Lesson 5: A handful of LEGO® blocks for every pair of students. Alternative: Sticky notes, construction paper.
• Unit 4, Lessons 1 & 5: Plastic bags, sticky notes, dry erase markers. Alternative: Envelopes.
• Unit 5, Lesson 1: Plastic bags, gallon-sized plastic bags, sticky notes, dry erase markers, tape. Alternative: Envelopes.
• Unit 6, Lessons 2 & 3: Sticky notes. Alternative: Scraps of paper.
• Unit 6, Lesson 4: Decks of cards. Alternative: Any item that could be combined into two categories (e.g. change with even / odd year).
• Unit 7, Lessons 1 & 5: Sticky notes, envelopes, plastic bags, file folders. Alternative: Scraps of paper, folders made of a folded sheet of paper, etc.

Optional Materials: The following supplies are completely optional but will be useful to have on hand for various lessons.

• Graph paper
• Chart paper
• Markers
• Post-it notes

With an approved teacher account, you can find answer keys in a blue "Teacher Only" panel that shows in the online lessons and activities.

Teachers in our Professional Learning Program will automatically be approved to view answer keys. If you need an approved teacher account, you can apply for access to protected teacher-only materials (answer keys, etc) through this form. Please keep in mind that it may take 3-5 business days to verify your account.

For the 2020-21 school year the College Board has made some significant updates to the CS Principles framework and AP assessment to ensure that CS Principles remains relevant and aligned with equivalent university courses. CS education research continues to reveal new insights on how students learn about computing, and feedback from the thousands of classrooms now using our CS Principles curriculum has identified opportunities to further improve our courses, tools, and recommended pedagogy.

The goal of the updates to our curriculum is to navigate these developments in a way that remains committed to our vision and values and supports the many teachers, schools, classrooms, and districts that are already a part of our broader CS Principles community. We remain deeply thankful for you joining us on this mission to make our collective vision a reality.

Code.org + CMU CS Academy AP CSP is an alternative option for Code.org's AP CSP course. Carnegie Mellon University has developed, in consultation with Code.org, an alternative option for Code.org's AP CSP course for teachers who want to teach the programming units using CMU CS Academy's Python offerings. Teachers using this option will teach using Code.org's AP CSP materials for all units with the exception of the programming units, which use JavaScript. For the programming units, students and teachers will work from the CMU CS Academy platform and program in Python.