For Years 7–8: what a computer's specifications measure (processor, RAM, storage, network, graphics), how each one affects how fast a job runs, finding the bottleneck, and choosing hardware for a job within a budget.
Each lesson works two ways. Students can work through the online tutorial at their own pace (it checks their answers and saves their progress in their browser), or you can teach it to the whole class from the slides, then send students into the tutorial for the Modify and Make steps.
Every lesson guide has plain-language notes, the answers to every check, a solution for every task, and slides and a worksheet for Waypoints Prepare. These guide pages are not linked from student pages, but they are not secret either: keep printed Teacher editions for answers you do not want students to find.
Whole-course cheat sheet: Open to print (every command, grouped by unit: a handout for the final challenge)
What each specification measures, which one slows a job down, and how to choose hardware for a job.
A computer's specifications say how much of each part it has. The processor works through instructions: its speed (GHz) is how many billion steps each core takes a second, and its cores are how many things it can work on at once. RAM is how much it can work on at once; it empties when the power goes off. Storage keeps everything, even with the power off: its size (GB, TB) is how much it holds, and its type sets how fast it reads (an SSD is far faster than a hard disk, HDD). Network bandwidth (Mb/s) is how much data can arrive each second. A graphics card has thousands of small processors that do the same simple sum at once, for pictures, games and AI.
A job is only as fast as its slowest part, the bottleneck. Upgrading anything else barely helps. Different jobs have different bottlenecks, so choosing hardware starts from the job: what does it need most, and what can you afford?
Processor = the chefs (how fast, how many). RAM = the bench (what you are working with now). Storage = the pantry (how much it holds, how far away). Network = the delivery van. Graphics card = a team of helpers who all chop at once.
Times add up part by part, and when RAM is too small the computer swaps to storage (slow on a hard disk). Real computers overlap these steps and have caches and other tricks; the board keeps one idea: the slowest part decides.
specification, processor, core, GHz, RAM, storage, SSD, HDD, bandwidth, graphics card (GPU), bottleneck, trade-off.
Cheat sheet: Open to print (A4, with board pictures) · Markdown