This study investigated the computational thinking (CT) practices of eight pre-service teachers through their Scratch and Python programs. Conducted within an undergraduate-level computer science education course, students learned CT concepts via parallel instruction in block-based programming (Scratch) and text-based programming (Python). The…

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…

Serious games seem to be a promising alternative to traditional practices for learning. Recently, their use in computer science education and learning programming became more widespread. Actually, many students in programming courses have difficulties to master all required competencies and skills especially at introductory level and games have…

The popular press is rife with examples of how students in the United States and around the globe are learning to program, make, and tinker. The Hour of Code, maker-education, and similar efforts are advocating that more students be exposed to principles found within computer science. We propose an expansion beyond simply teaching computational…

The first data structure that first-year undergraduate students learn during the programming and algorithms courses is the one-dimensional array. For novice programmers, it might be hard to understand different algorithms on arrays (e.g. searching, mirroring, sorting algorithms), because the algorithms dynamically change the values of elements. In…

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…

Tangible programming tools enable children to easily learn the programming process, previously considered to be difficult for them. While various tangible programming tools have been developed, there is still a lack of available tools to help students experience the general programming process. This study therefore developed a tool called…

Agile software development is an iterative and incremental methodology, where solutions evolve from self-organizing, cross-functional teams. Pair programming is a type of agile software development technique where two programmers work together with one computer for developing software. This paper reports the results of the pair programming…

In this article we demonstrate how the combination of a system for dynamic geometry with a freely programmable scripting environment can be advantageously used in teaching and research. We explain the reasons behind various design decisions that were made by us when designing the language "CindyScript" and give examples that proof how…

The topics of computer architecture are always taught using an Assembly dialect as an example. The most commonly used textbooks in this field use the MIPS64 Instruction Set Architecture (ISA) to help students in learning the fundamentals of computer architecture because of its orthogonality and its suitability for real-world applications. This…

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…

This paper investigates the impact of combining self explaining (SE) with computer architecture diagrams to help novice students learn assembly language programming. Pre- and post-test scores for the experimental and control groups were compared and subjected to covariance (ANCOVA) statistical analysis. Results indicate that the SE-plus-diagram…

The Internet has recently encouraged the society to convert almost all its needs to electronic resources such as e-libraries, e-cultures, e-entertainment as well as e-learning, which has become a radical idea to increase the effectiveness of learning services in most schools, colleges and universities. E-learning can not be completely featured and…

Programming courses have always been a difficult part of an Information Systems curriculum. While we do not train Information Systems students to be developers, understanding how to build a system always gives students an added perspective to improve their system design and analysis skills. This teaching tip presents CFC (Comment-First-Coding)--a…

In the information systems field there are numerous programming languages that can be used in specifying the behavior of concurrent and distributed systems. In the literature it has been argued that a lack of pragmatic and semantic consideration decreases the effectiveness of such specifications. In other words, to simply understand the syntactic…