> It also was weird as it didn't match how normal people would solve the problem. If I can solve a problem by building from preexisting LEGO blocks then I'll p

> It also was weird as it didn't match how normal people would solve the problem. If I can solve a problem by building from preexisting LEGO blocks then I'll probably do that, but it wouldn't be a valuable learning exercise. Students aren't being given problems in need of effective solution, these problems are tools to facilitate understanding. What you described could be pointless if it made you work on reimplementing trivial stuff that you'd already mastered long time ago instead of focusing on actual problem. Writing your 100th hashmap implementation or yet another I2C driver isn't particularly valuable. Since you mentioned "barely passing", I don't think that was the case though.