An application-centered course on data-driven web sites

In this paper, we describe our experience with an application-centered approach in teaching a course on web technology. The purpose of the course was to teach the principles of data-base driven web sites, their design and the integration of the underlying components. The class was partitioned into small teams, where each team had their own dedicated server. Each team was responsible for achieving certain milestones that culminated in the implementation of a data-base driven web site. Lectures and demonstrations were used to provide information on a need-to-know basis. Our experience was highly positive. Synergy and student motivation grew as the course progressed. By the end of the semester teams had developed near-professional quality web sites. We describe course details including syllabus, lecture topics, and milestone objectives