Natural language helps express mathematical thinking and contexts. Conventional mathematical notation (CMN) best suits expressions and equations. Each is essential; each also has limitations, especially for learners. Our research studies how programming can be a advantageous third language that can also help restore mathematical connections that…

Contribution: In this article, the authors present findings and insights on the efficacy of using an educational block-based programming (BBP) environment--Blocks4DS, to teach the binary search tree (BST). Background: For a decade, BBP environments have been a hot topic in the computer science education (CSEd) community to promote interactive…

Object-oriented programming (OOP) is not only an integral part of computing degrees but also a requirement in non-computing majors such as engineering. Understanding OOP concepts can be difficult for novice programmers, and often leads to the development of misconceptions. This is exacerbated when the discipline requires students to learn a…

Programming is becoming increasingly common in mathematics degrees as it is a desirable skill for new graduates. However, research shows that its use is mostly restricted to computational or modelling tasks. This paper reports a study on students' perceptions of and difficulties with Lean, an interactive theorem prover introduced as part of a…

When we "think like a computer scientist," we are able to systematically solve problems in different fields, create software applications that support various needs, and design artefacts that model complex systems. Abstraction is a soft skill embedded in all those endeavours, being a main cornerstone of computational thinking. Our…

Concurrency is often perceived as difficult by students. One reason for this may be due to the fact that abstractions used in concurrent programs leave more situations undefined compared to sequential programs (e.g., in what order statements are executed), which makes it harder to create a proper mental model of the execution environment. Students…

Curricula in computer engineering, computer science, and other related fields include several courses about hardware design. Examples of these courses are digital logic design, computer architecture, microprocessors, computer interfacing, hardware design, embedded systems, switching theorem, and others. In order for the students to realize the…

Object-oriented programming distinguishes between instance attributes and methods and class attributes and methods, annotated by the "static" modifier. Novices encounter difficulty understanding the means and implications of "static" attributes and methods. The paper has two outcomes: (a) a detailed classification of aspects of…

This paper proposes the design of an ontology of multiple programming languages and give three examples to show the methodology. Our ontology aims to summarize the core of computational thinking logic by elaborating the concepts of three object-oriented programming languages in the industry: Python, Java, and C#. Therefore, the construction of the…

Instruction in an introductory programming course is typically designed to introduce new concepts and to review and integrate the more recent concepts with what was previously learned in the course. Therefore, most exam questions in an introductory programming course require students to write lines of code that contain syntactic elements…

The purpose of this study was to investigate how the 8th graders interpreted the equal sign in the pan balance activities they created on Scratch. Five eighth graders (4 girls and 1 boy) in Turkey participated in this study. Case study was employed as a qualitative research method. Data was gathered through the Scratch files created by the…

Probability is generally considered one of the most challenging areas to teach in mathematics education due to its intricate nature. However, the simulation-based teaching method can increase students' accessibility significantly to the probability problems because it enables students to resolve the problems with minimal mathematical skills. By…

Programming skills are increasingly important to the current digital economy, yet these skills have long been regarded as challenging to acquire. A central challenge in learning programming skills involves the simultaneous use of multiple component skills. This article investigates why students struggle with integrating component skills--a…

We developed an interactive online textbook that interleaves R programming activities with text as a way to facilitate students' understanding of statistical ideas while minimizing the cognitive and emotional burden of learning programming. In this exploratory study, we characterize the attitudes and experiences of 672 undergraduate students as…

We live in a digital age, not least accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. It is all the more important in our society that students learn and master the key competence of algorithmic thinking to understand the informatics concepts behind every digital phenomena and thus is able to actively shape the future. For this to be successful, concepts must…