Programming is recognised as one of seven grand challenges in computing education and attracts much attention in computing education research. Most research in the area concerns teaching methods, educational technology and student understanding/misconceptions. Typically, evaluation of learning outcome takes place during or immediately following…

This study is focused on the relationships among learning styles, participation types, and learning performance for programming language learning supported by an online forum. Kolb's learning style inventory was used in this study to determine a learner's learning type: "Diverger", "Assimilator", "Converger", and "Accommodator". Social Learning…

The rise of apps and mobile devices has opened the door to small, dedicated software programs that are focused on singular tasks. From the author's perspective as head of digital access and web service manager at Montana State University, these apps offered an opportunity to build a focused digital service aimed at allowing someone to enter a…

In this paper, a client/server information system for the management of data and its extraction from a database containing information for diploma works of students is proposed. The developed system provides users the possibility of accessing information about different characteristics of the diploma works, according to their specific interests.…

Students' struggles with algebra are well documented. Prior to the introduction of functions, mathematics is typically focused on applying a set of arithmetic operations to compute an answer. The introduction of functions, however, marks the point at which mathematics begins to focus on building up abstractions as a way to solve complex problems.…

Learning to program is a complex task, and the impact of different pedagogical approaches to teach this skill has been hard to measure. This study examined the performance data of seven cohorts of students (N = 1168) learning programming under three different pedagogical approaches. These pedagogical approaches varied either in the length of the…

This descriptive study determined which of the sources of errors would predict the errors committed by novice Java programmers. Descriptive statistics revealed that the respondents perceived that they committed the identified eighteen errors infrequently. Thought error was perceived to be the main source of error during the laboratory programming…

In this paper, we discuss the visual programming approach to teaching introductory programming courses and then compare this approach with that of procedural programming. The involved cognitive levels of students, as beginning students are introduced to different types of programming concepts, are correlated to the learning processes of…

Teaching Polymorphism can be best implemented by using a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches. However, from our observation and students' self-reporting, the former seems to be the predominant in the Saudi context. We try to investigate whether applying a more balanced approach in teaching the comprehensive concept of Polymorphism…

In this paper, we describe the design and implementation of computer programming activities aimed at introducing young students (9-13 years old) to the idea of infinity, and in particular, to the cardinality of infinite sets. This research was part of the "WebLabs" project where students from several European countries explored topics in…

Recursion is an important concept for any computer science student to master. Many first year students develop the viable "copies" mental model of recursion and can successfully trace the execution of a simple recursive function. This article discusses a study focused on determining whether the ability to successfully trace a recursive…

The theory and practice of search algorithms related to state-space represented problems form the major part of the introductory course of Artificial Intelligence at most of the universities and colleges offering a degree in the area of computer science. Students usually meet these algorithms only in some imperative or object-oriented language…

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…

When first introduced to the analysis of algorithms, students are taught how to assess the best and worst cases, whereas the mean and amortized costs are considered advanced topics, usually saved for graduates. When presenting the latter, aggregate analysis is explained first because it is the most intuitive kind of amortized analysis, often…

In this case study, a group of nine 4th grade children were introduced to the Logo programming language during three 90-minute sessions over a four-week period. They attended a private university-based laboratory school serving students with various learning disabilities. This project demonstrated that a classic version of Logo captured the…