CSCI C463 -  Artificial Intelligence Teaching/Learning Goals

The Who and What of C463

Who - Anyone with an interest in understanding and applying AI. This course satisfies the Computer Science requirement for a C3xx or C4xx course.

What (CC2001 Computer Science) - The course follows the Association of Computing Machinery's Curriculum 2001 guide for university computer science programs. The guide provides the following description:

The field of artificial intelligence (AI) is concerned with the design and analysis of autonomous agents. These are software systems and/or physical machines, with sensors and actuators, embodied for example within a robot or an autonomous spacecraft. An intelligent system has to perceive its environment, to act rationally towards its assigned tasks, to interact with other agents and with human beings. These capabilities are covered by topics such as computer vision, planning and acting, robotics, multiagents systems, speech recognition, and natural language understanding. They rely on a broad set of general and specialized knowledge representations and reasoning mechanisms, on problem solving and search algorithms, and on machine learning techniques.

Furthermore, artificial intelligence provides a set of tools for solving problems that are difficult or impractical to solve with other methods. These include heuristic search and planning algorithms, formalisms for knowledge representation and reasoning, machine learning techniques, and methods applicable to sensing and action problems such as speech and language understanding, computer vision, and robotics, among others. The student needs to be able to determine when an AI approach is appropriate for a given problem, and to be able to select and implement a suitable AI method.

Small exercises serve to highlight key course topics while homeworks provide practice with and exposure to AI methods. The homeworks include the design and implementation of solutions using common AI methods such as neural nets, genetic algorithms, planners and several searches. More specific information can be obtained by reading the following discussion of course goals or by examining exercises listed as homeworks on the course syllabus.

CSCI C463 Learning Goals

The learning goals of each computer science course strive to capture intended learning outcomes. The goals are expressed using the terms that follow. These terms describe the level of familiarity (most to least) with respect to various kinds of material and procedures.

• Mastery means the student will be able to exhibit knowledge of the material and/or skill with the procedure, in a new but appropriate context, even when not instructed to do so.
• Familiarity means the student will be able to answer questions about the material and/or to use the procedure, in a new but appropriate context, when instructed to do do.
• Exposure means the student will have heard the term and/or seen the procedure, but may not be able to discuss or use it effectively without further instruction.

The C463 learning goals cover important areas recommended jointly in a report by the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) and the Computer Society of the IEEE in 2001 for university computing curricula. These international organizations were established to promote academic and professional excellence in the computer sciences. The complete baccalaureate curricula list consists of fourteen subject areas, of which a portion are covered in this course, primarily those areas which better prepare the student to succeed in subsequent Indiana University Southeast computer science courses and as professional computer scientists. Certain of these subjects listed below have been presented in previous courses or will recur in subsequent courses.

• Mastery
1. IS1 - Fundamental issues in intelligent systems (1)
• Familiarity
1. IS2 - Search and constraint satisfaction. (5)
2. IS3 - Knowledge representation and reasoning. (4)
3. IS4 - Advanced search. (2)
4. IS6 - Agents (8)
5. IS8 - Machine learning and neural networks. (3)
6. IS9 - AI planning systems. (4)
• Exposure

Design of C463 to Achieve These Goals

Computer science demands competency in a range of skills. Therefore, students benefit from the guided practice in the environment of a university class. To facilitate this, C463 includes the following:

1. Students complete weekly assignments aimed at developing and practicing foundational skills.
2. Class time is divided between instructor lecture and student discussion. Individual student questions serve to guide the class discussion.
3. Assignments are available as Web-pages and are discussed in class when assigned using the pages available to the student.
4. Most questions arise when students are working on exercises outside of class. Students are encouraged to contact the instructor directly or by emailing their questions and code of the troublesome homework for guidance.

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