This study investigated the computational thinking (CT) practices of eight pre-service teachers through their Scratch and Python programs. Conducted within an undergraduate-level computer science education course, students learned CT concepts via parallel instruction in block-based programming (Scratch) and text-based programming (Python). The…

Purpose: This study aims to report the design, development and evaluation of a digital quality assurance application aimed at improving and ensuring the quality of assessment programmes in higher education. Design/methodology/approach: The application was developed using a design-based research (DBR) methodology. The application's design was…

The study is aimed at solving a problem generated by the necessity to change the organizational forms of digital learning to prepare graduates who meet the requirements of today's labor market; who are equipped with teamwork skills and skills of project-management under uncertainty which are especially relevant nowadays. The purpose of the study…

This design case describes design decisions and their impacts during three redesigns of an educational game called the "Rocks and Minerals Challenge." This game was developed as a laboratory supplement for the rocks and minerals component of a university-based geology course. The game has evolved through three distinct design phases:…

Augmented Reality (AR) technology allows the inclusion of virtual elements on a vision of actual physical environment for the creation of a mixed reality in real time. This kind of technology can be used in educational settings. However, the current AR authoring tools present several drawbacks, such as, the lack of a mechanism for tracking the…

The field of Web development has evolved and diversified significantly in recent years, and narrowing the gap between the requirements of academia and the demands of industry remains a challenge. Moreover, many faculty members often struggle with knowing "how much" of a particular subject they should teach to their students and at what…

Agile software development is an iterative and incremental methodology, where solutions evolve from self-organizing, cross-functional teams. Pair programming is a type of agile software development technique where two programmers work together with one computer for developing software. This paper reports the results of the pair programming…

The availability of user-friendly coding software is increasing, yet teachers might hesitate to use this technology to develop for educational needs. This paper discusses studies related to technology for educational uses and introduces an evaluation application being developed. Through questionnaires by student users and open-ended discussion by…

This paper describes a course in programmable logic design and computer architecture as it is taught at the University of Newcastle, Australia. The course is designed around a major design project and has two supplemental assessment tasks that are also described. The context of the Computer Engineering degree program within which the course is…

Large-sized repositories of learning objects (LOs) are difficult to create and also to maintain. In this paper we propose a way to reduce this drawback by improving the classification mechanisms of the LO repositories. Specifically, we present a solution to automate the LO classification of the Universia repository, a collection of more than 15…

Modern robots, like today's smartphones, are complex devices with intricate software systems. Introductory robot programming courses must evolve to reflect this reality, by teaching students to make use of the sophisticated tools their robots provide rather than reimplementing basic algorithms. This paper focuses on teaching with Tekkotsu, an open…

Anecdotal evidence shows that in computer programming courses plagiarism is a widespread problem. With the growing number of students in such courses, manual plagiarism detection is impractical. This requires instructors to use one of the many available plagiarism detection tools. Prior to choosing one of such tools, a metric that assures the…

In this article, we present the characteristics and the design of a modular personalized multimedia testing tool based fully on XML learning specifications. Personalization is based on the characteristics of the individual learners, thus the testing paths are tailored to their needs and goals. The system maintains learner profiles rich in content…

Purpose: The broader adoption of the internet along with web-based systems has defined a new way of exchanging information. That advance added by the multiplication of mobile devices has required systems to be even more flexible and personalized. Maybe because of that, the traditional teaching-controlled learning style has given up space to a new…

Carefully engineered playable games can serve as vehicles for students and practitioners to learn and explore the programming of advanced computer architectures to execute applications, such as high performance computing (HPC) and complex, inter-networked, distributed systems. The article presents families of playable games that are grounded in…