Prior studies in the Computer Science education literature have illustrated that novices make many mistakes in composing SQL queries. Query formulation proves to be difficult for students. Only recently, some headway was made towards understanding why SQL leads to so many mistakes, by uncovering student misconceptions. In this article, we shed new…

This exploratory study reports on characteristics of proof production and proof writing observed in the work of first-year university students who took part in workshops on the theorem prover LEAN (https://leanprover.github.io). These workshops were voluntary and offered alongside a transition to proof module in a UK university. Through…

In computer science education at school, computational thinking has been an emerging topic over the last decade. Even though, computational thinking is interpreted and integrated in classrooms in different ways, an identification process about what computational thinking is about has been in progress among computer science school-teachers and…

This paper reports a study which investigated the extent to which undergraduate mathematics students in the United Kingdom are currently taught to programme a computer as a core part of their mathematics degree programme. We undertook an online survey, with significant follow-up correspondence, to gather data on current curricula and received…

Perspectives of students on what constitutes source-code plagiarism may differ based on their educational background. Surveys have been conducted with home students undertaking computing and joint computing subject degrees at higher education institutions throughout the UK, China, and South Cyprus, and a total of 984 responses have been…

The steep learning curve associated with computer programming can be a daunting prospect, particularly for those not well aligned with this way of logical thinking. However, programming is a skill that is becoming increasingly important. Geography graduates entering careers in atmospheric science are one example of a particularly diverse group who…

This article reports an investigation into undergraduate student experiences and views of a visual or "blocks" based programming language and its environment. An additional and central aspect of this enquiry is to substantiate the perceived degree of transferability of programming skills learnt within the visual environment to a typical…

This article critiques learning design as a representation for sharing and developing practice, based on synthesis of three projects. Starting with the findings of the Mod4L Models of Practice project, it argues that the technical origins of learning design, and the consequent focus on structure and sequence, limit its usefulness for sharing…

This paper presents a new laboratory-based module for embedded systems teaching, which addresses the current lack of consideration for the link between hardware development, software implementation, course content and student evaluation in a laboratory environment. The course introduces second year undergraduate students to the interface between…

Debugging is often difficult and frustrating for novices. Yet because students typically debug outside the classroom and often in isolation, instructors rarely have the opportunity to closely observe students while they debug. This paper describes the details of an exploratory study of the debugging skills and behaviors of contemporary novice Java…

Software for text processing and presentation design is becoming increasingly sophisticated. Nevertheless, it is difficult to find a good solution for collaborative writing of technical course material, allowing the creation of high quality lecture notes and presentation slides from a single source. This article presents a new editing framework…

Speech technology--especially automatic speech recognition--has now advanced to a level where it can be of great benefit both to able-bodied people and those with various disabilities. In this paper we describe an application "TalkMaths" which, using the output from a commonly-used conventional automatic speech recognition system,…

This article examines the broad scope of systemised learning (e-learning) in post-statutory education. Issues for discussion include the origins and forms of learning systems, including technical and educational concepts and approaches, such as distributed and collaborative learning. The VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) is defined as the…

Discusses the use of computers in undergraduate mathematics. Highlights include external software, including spreadsheets and theorem provers; computer generated assessment; multimedia software; computer programming languages; geometric visualization tools; computer algebra systems; and examples from the United States, the United Kingdom, and…

Initially available from universities and individual enthusiasts, software tools to author World Wide Web pages are maturing into very feature-rich applications and are now offered by large corporations. These applications are enabling more companies to create and maintain pages themselves on the Web or on corporate Intranets. The market continues…