Computer programming is regarded as an important skill for the future. However, many K-12 students face challenges and difficulties in learning traditional text-based programming. Block-based visual programming (BVP) can reduce the difficulty of learning programming and is seen as a potential programming education tool. Nevertheless, the effects…

Teaching and learning programming, and especially Object-Oriented Programming (OOP), is a complicated and challenging task. Students have to comprehend various OOP concepts and utilize them for designing object-oriented programs. Various types of educational programming environments, such as microworlds and educational games, have been devised for…

Computational thinking (CT), an essential 21st century skill, incorporates key computer science concepts such as abstraction, algorithms, and debugging. Debugging is particularly underrepresented in the CT training literature. This multi-level meta-analysis focused on debugging as a core CT skill, and investigated the effects of various debugging…

This article provides an overview of the diverse ways in which computational thinking has been operationalised in the literature. Computational thinking has attracted much interest and debatably ranks in importance with the time-honoured literacy skills of reading, writing, and arithmetic. However, learning interventions in this subject have…

Computational thinking is believed to be beneficial for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) learning as it is closely related to many other skills required by STEM disciplines. There has been an increasing interest in integrating computational thinking into STEM and many studies have been conducted to examine the effects of…

Underpinning the teaching of coding with Computational Thinking has proved relevant for diverse learners, particularly given the increasing demand in upskilling for today's labour market. While literature on computing education is vast, it remains unexplored how existing CT conceptualisations relate to the learning opportunities needed for a…

This paper presents a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) of fifty-seven studies on Distributed Pair Programming (DPP) in higher education, identifying which studies investigated factors on the effectiveness of DPP as a method for learning programming, factors related to mediating and stimulating interactions between students, the…

Computational thinking (CT) education has drawn increasing attention from educators and researchers. This study conducted a meta-analysis of 27 empirical studies to examine the effectiveness of game-based learning (GBL) for fostering students' CT. The effects of various factors on the learning process for acquiring CT were also examined. The…

The importance of computational thinking (CT) as a 21st-century skill for future generations has been a key consideration in the reforms of many national and regional educational systems. Much attention has been paid to integrating CT into the traditional subject classrooms. This paper describes a scoping review of learning tools for integrating…

Although abstraction is widely understood to be one of the primary components of computational thinking, the roots of abstraction may be traced back to different fields. Hence, the meaning of abstraction in the context of computational thinking is often confounded, as researchers interpret abstraction through diverse lenses. To disentangle these…

Block-based visual programming tools, such as Scratch, Alice, and MIT App Inventor, provide an intuitive and easy-to-use editing interface through which to promote programming learning for novice students of various ages. However, very little attention has been paid to investigating these tools' overall effects on students' academic achievement…