You ran a dozen algorithms before first period — you just did not call them that. A locker combination. The rule for when the crosswalk is yours. The order you get dressed in. This hunt sends you out to catch five of them in the wild and pin down what, exactly, makes each one an algorithm rather than just a habit.
The task
Over one day, find and document five algorithms you actually follow — not ones you read about. For each: the steps, written so a stranger could follow them; what the input is; what the result is; and one place where the steps branch or repeat. At least one specimen must come from outside a screen. Bring all five back — they become raw material for The Algorithm Field Guide.
Getting started (click to expand)
- Stuck at zero? Watch your own hands the next time you open your locker, transfer buses, or shuffle a deck. Steps you never chose consciously are the best specimens.
- Ask of each candidate: could I hand these steps to someone else and get the same result? If yes, you may have caught one.
- Game rules, recipes, tie-breakers, and “who goes first” rituals are algorithm-rich territory.
What tends to surface
Comparing specimens, the class starts drawing a line: some steps are precise enough to hand over, and some quietly rely on judgement — and that line is the definition this course spends a semester on. The branches you found are Conditionals before the name; the repeats are Loops; and Algorithms in Everyday Life picks up exactly where your five specimens leave off.
An extension
Take your cleanest specimen and write it as numbered steps a Human Robot could execute. Where it breaks — and it will — mark the judgement your written steps were smuggling in.
The answer is not on this page
There is no master list of correct algorithms to check against — every hunter’s day is different. The class builds the definition together, out of the specimens everyone brings back.
Curriculum connection
C1.2
describe simple algorithms that are encountered in everyday situations
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A1.2
use a variety of tools and processes to plan, design, and share algorithms and computational artifacts
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