Teaching parallel programming using both high-level and low-level languages

We discuss the use of both high-level and low-level languages in the teaching of senior undergraduate and junior graduate classes in parallel and distributed computing. We briefly introduce several language standards and discuss why we have chosen to use OpenMP and MPI in our parallel computing class. Major features of OpenMP are briefly introduced and advantages of using OpenMP over message passing methods are discussed. We also include a brief enumeration of some of the drawbacks of using OpenMP and how these draw-backs are being addressed by supplementing OpenMP with additional MPI codes and projects. Several projects given in our class are also described in this paper.