I actually think you've got an XY problem here. From my experience of learning software languages, this doesn't feel like the most practical way of running it.

In general for learning a programming language, there should be a lot of practical time and a relatively small amount of lecture time. More than that, the practical time needs to be rather free-form and allow scope for better students to complete exercises quickly and slower students to take much longer over it. Simply dividing your class into two halves cannot ever cope with this - either it wastes time or holds back quicker students, or it prevents slower students completing exercises.

When I was at uni, the better solution was one lecture in a classroom, followed (same day, different day, doesn't matter) with an entire afternoon in a computer lab. For the computer lab session, the lecturer often wasn't there, but one or more teaching assistants were always on hand to answer questions, review code, and generally point people in the right direction. After that fixed time, the lecturer and teaching assistants left, but students who hadn't finished could naturally keep working on their own. Most students didn't have laptops at the time (this was the mid 90s!) but there was nothing in principle to stop people bringing in their own machines.

Edit based on your changes to the question: With your new information, it makes it even clearer that your original proposal simply won't work, and two separate exercises is the way to solve it. Getting information to 90 people is a lecture theatre job. Even dividing this into 4 sessions, you cannot make that work in a computer lab, and the lecturing component will take four times as much of your time. Anything other than a lecture theatre will fail, waste your time, and waste your students' time. Conversely, on the practical side there's no other option than dividing the group up so that they all get a guaranteed seat in the computer lab at some point.

I actually think you've got an XY problem here. From my experience of learning software languages, this doesn't feel like the most practical way of running it.

In general for learning a programming language, there should be a lot of practical time and a relatively small amount of lecture time. More than that, the practical time needs to be rather free-form and allow scope for better students to complete exercises quickly and slower students to take much longer over it. Simply dividing your class into two halves cannot ever cope with this - either it wastes time or holds back quicker students, or it prevents slower students completing exercises.

When I was at uni, the better solution was one lecture in a classroom, followed (same day, different day, doesn't matter) with an entire afternoon in a computer lab. For the computer lab session, the lecturer often wasn't there, but one or more teaching assistants were always on hand to answer questions, review code, and generally point people in the right direction. After that fixed time, the lecturer and teaching assistants left, but students who hadn't finished could naturally keep working on their own. Most students didn't have laptops at the time (this was the mid 90s!) but there was nothing in principle to stop people bringing in their own machines.

Edit based on your changes to the question: With your new information, it makes it even clearer that your original proposal simply won't work, and two separate exercises is the way to solve it. Getting information to 90 people is a lecture theatre job. Even dividing this into 4 sessions, you cannot make that work in a computer lab, and the lecturing component will take four times as much of your time. Anything other than a lecture theatre will fail, waste your time, and waste your students' time. Conversely, on the practical side there's no other option than dividing the group up so that they all get a guaranteed seat in the computer lab at some point.

I actually think you've got an XY problem here. From my experience of learning software languages, this doesn't feel like the most practical way of running it.

In general for learning a programming language, there should be a lot of practical time and a relatively small amount of lecture time. More than that, the practical time needs to be rather free-form and allow scope for better students to complete exercises quickly and slower students to take much longer over it. Simply dividing your class into two halves cannot ever cope with this - either it wastes time or holds back quicker students, or it prevents slower students completing exercises.

When I was at uni, the better solution was one lecture in a classroom, followed (same day, different day, doesn't matter) with an entire afternoon in a computer lab. For the computer lab session, the lecturer often wasn't there, but one or more teaching assistants were always on hand to answer questions, review code, and generally point people in the right direction. After that fixed time, the lecturer and teaching assistants left, but students who hadn't finished could naturally keep working on their own. Most students didn't have laptops at the time (this was the mid 90s!) but there was nothing in principle to stop people bringing in their own machines.

I actually think you've got an XY problem here. From my experience of learning software languages, this doesn't feel like the most practical way of running it.

In general for learning a programming language, there should be a lot of practical time and a relatively small amount of lecture time. More than that, the practical time needs to be rather free-form and allow scope for better students to complete exercises quickly and slower students to take much longer over it. Simply dividing your class into two halves cannot ever cope with this - either it wastes time or holds back quicker students, or it prevents slower students completing exercises.

When I was at uni, the better solution was one lecture in a classroom, followed (same day, different day, doesn't matter) with an entire afternoon in a computer lab. For the computer lab session, the lecturer often wasn't there, but one or more teaching assistants were always on hand to answer questions, review code, and generally point people in the right direction. After that fixed time, the lecturer and teaching assistants left, but students who hadn't finished could naturally keep working on their own. Most students didn't have laptops at the time (this was the mid 90s!) but there was nothing in principle to stop people bringing in their own machines.

Edit based on your changes to the question: With your new information, it makes it even clearer that your original proposal simply won't work, and two separate exercises is the way to solve it. Getting information to 90 people is a lecture theatre job. Even dividing this into 4 sessions, you cannot make that work in a computer lab, and the lecturing component will take four times as much of your time. Anything other than a lecture theatre will fail, waste your time, and waste your students' time. Conversely, on the practical side there's no other option than dividing the group up so that they all get a guaranteed seat in the computer lab at some point.