Software modeling is an integral practice for software engineers, especially as the complexity of software solutions increases. Unified Modeling Language (UML) is the industry standard for software modeling. however, it is often used incorrectly and misunderstood by novice software designers. This study is centered around understanding patterns of…

This research applies the roles of variables to the novice programmers in the C language programming. The results are evaluated using the Structure of Observed Learning Outcomes (SOLO) taxonomy. The participants were divided into an experimental group and a control group. The students from the control group learned programming in the traditional…

The two case studies reported in this article contribute to a better understanding of how inquiry tasks and activities are employed as resourceful means for learning in higher professional education. An observation-based approach was used to explore characteristics of and challenges in students' participation in collaborative inquiry activities in…

Object-oriented analysis and design (OOAD) is not an easy subject to learn. There are many challenges confronting students when studying OOAD. Students have particular difficulty abstracting real-world problems within the context of OOAD. They are unable to effectively build object-oriented (OO) models from the problem domain because they…

A multi-case study approach was used in this study to investigate how parents and children collaborated with each other when they learned to program in MSWLogo together. Three parent-child pairs were observed directly in a five-day computer camp. Each pair was assigned a total of 33 programming tasks to work on. The observation focused on how…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe and discuss the use of specifically-developed, inquiry-based learning materials for Computing and Forensic Computing students. Small applications have been developed which require investigation in order to de-bug code, analyse data issues and discover "illegal" behaviour. The applications…

This paper presents an example of integrating IT skills using an interesting real life problem. We describe how the reverse- and forward-engineering of the USA National Do Not Call registry was used in our capstone course to illustrate the fusion of different (but interdependent) issues and techniques learned in the IT program. The purpose of the…

This study utilized elements of technology-rich ethnography to create a rich description of a multi-user virtual environment in a high school computer programming class. Of particular interest was the transition that took place in classroom culture from one characterized by a well-defined problem solving approach to one more indicative of open…

Despite the multiple potential benefits of asking students working on programming tasks to consider human factors, most programming assignments narrowly focus on technical details and requirements. Female students in particular may be attracted to assignments that emphasize human as well as technical factors. To assess how students respond to…