Much attention in constructionism has focused on designing tools and activities that support learners in designing fully finished and functional applications and artefacts to be shared with others. But helping students learn to debug their applications often takes on a surprisingly more instructionist stance by giving them checklists, teaching…

Engineering and technology educators continually strive for realistic, hands-on laboratory exercises to enhance their students' learning. This research describes the redesign of an undergraduate introductory computer networking course to include new weekly virtual laboratory assignments that culminate in a 'real world' final project of configuring…

This paper presents an implementation of Connected Spaces (CxS)--an ambient help seeking interface designed and developed for a project-based computing classroom. We use actor network theory (ANT) to provide an underutilized posthumanist lens to understand the creation of collaborative connections in this Computational Action-based implementation.…

This paper argues for the need to develop a relational, emergent and plural understanding of learning spaces. We take an ecological perspective on learning, which allows us to conceptualize learning spaces as (co-)constructed by learners; emerging through learners' practices, interactions and activities; and facilitated by pedagogical…

An increasing number of countries have recently included programming education in their curricula. Similarly, utilizing programming concepts in gameplay has become popular in the videogame industry. Although many games have been developed for learning to program, their variety and their correspondence to national curricula remain an uncharted…

Although there is wide rhetoric that programming should be learnt by all as an element of computational thinking (CT), in practice, it is mostly implemented narrowly as an end in itself consisting of routine practice and traditional testing of the ability to code. This paper discusses a way in which programming could be seen through a wider…

The incorporation of advanced information and communication technologies into the field of education has made the design and deployment of courses and instructional units more and more complicated. In order to support such complex task, methods and techniques have been proposed in the last years for the standardization, formalization and modelling…

This paper presents the results of a systematic review of the literature, including a meta-analysis, about the effectiveness of the use of Alice software in programming learning when compared to the use of a conventional programming language. Our research included studies published between the years 2000 and 2014 in the main databases. We gathered…

The addition of computing to England's National Curriculum was welcomed as a much-needed modernization of the country's digital skills curriculum, replacing a poorly regarded ICT program of study with an industry-supported scheme of computer science, robotics and computational thinking. This paper will demonstrate how teachers have acted as…

Reflection is a critical factor in solving design problems. Using good methods to observe designers' reflection is essential to inform the design of the learning environments that support the development of design problem-solving skills. In this study, we have developed and validated a novel self-reporting questionnaire as an efficient instrument…

Although past research has sought to identify the factors of student engagement in traditional online courses, two questions remained largely unanswered with regard to Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): do the factors that could influence student engagement in traditional online courses also apply to online courses that are massive and open?…

The popularity of mobile devices has encouraged the advance of ubiquitous learning, in which students are situated in a real-world learning environment with support from the digital world via the use of mobile, wireless communications, or even sensing technologies. Most of the ubiquitous learning systems are implemented with high-cost sensing…

This paper examines the use of virtual interactions in a Communication class at Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT)-South Africa. It demonstrates how synthesising virtual and other computer-assisted exercises as well as traditional classroom-based activities can enhance the teaching and learning of communication concepts. The paper is…

In the digital age, instructional designers must possess both a sound instructional design knowledge base and solid project management skills that will enable them to complete courseware projects on time, on budget and in conformance with client expectations. Project management skills include the ability to apply repeatable processes, along with…

This paper discusses Svetovid, cross-platform software that helps instructors to assess the amount of effort put into practical exercises and exams in courses related to computer programming. The software was developed as an attempt at solving problems associated with practical exercises and exams. This paper discusses the design and use of…