H60C 46 Computing: Academic Skills

This is the latest version of the Cisco IT Essentails course which has been updated for 2023/24 and includes activities and learning related to Windows 11. The Cisco IT Essentials (ITE) curriculum offers a hands-on, career-oriented learning experience with an emphasis on practical activities to help students develop fundamental computer and career skills. IT Essentials helps students prepare for entry-level ICT career opportunities and the CompTIA A+ certification. On completion f the Cisco IT Essentials course learners will receive an official Cisco Networking Academy certificate. The IT Essentials course builds on learning that has already been covered in SQA HN Units and expands learner experience with modules on virtualisation, mobile technology, customer support and printers.

This unit will allow learners to work collaboratively within a group to plan, design, implement, test and evaluate a computing project. Learners will be required to produce a project in response to a project brief that can be formulated by negotiation between learners and their lecturer. The project should be completed by a project team working together, but with individual learners having defined areas of responsibility. The planning, design, implementation and testing stages should be carried out collaboratively; however each learner must complete an individual evaluation of the project as a whole from inception to completion. 

Learners will gain experience designing and creating applications using Visual Basic. Learners will also develop their programming, problem solving and computational thinking skills, as well as a knowledge and understanding of design concepts. Learner's understanding of the different methodologies and approaches for testing and evaluation will be included when applications are tested and they critically evaluate the process, their application and their own performance.

This Unit introduces learners to the theory of modern computer networks. Learners are introduced to the basic concepts of computer networking such as the different types of networks, network devices and network media. The Unit also covers the theory which underpins the way data is transferred over a computer network and the use of the network protocols and network utilities in that data transfer. Assessment for this unit is a single multiple choice test which will be offered to learners at the end of the course.