The problem of the lack of rigor in CS education research has frequently been discussed and examined. Previous reviews of the literature have examined rigor on both theoretical and methodological dimensions, among others. These reviews have also looked at differences in indicators of rigor between conference proceedings and journal publications. However, to date there is no comprehensive review that has examined the intersection of methodological and theoretical quality. This paper reports results from a literature review in which we analyzed both the use of theory and methodological rigor of four years of CS education research from the Computer Science Education (CSE) journal and the proceedings of the International Computing Education Research (ICER) conference. The goal was to provide an updated and expanded picture of the methodological quality and use of theory in the most rigorous CS education publications, as well as to compare between conference proceedings and journal publications on these dimensions. Our focus was on research that draws upon learning theory from education, psychology and other disciplines outside CS education.The results of our review show a different picture than earlier reviews. Focus on empirical results in conference proceedings articles has surpassed that of journal publications, and empirical studies are significantly more likely to make use of theory from outside CS education. Overall, our analysis shows a significant increase in the proportion of articles drawing on theory from outside CS education, compared to earlier literature reviews, whereas indicators of methodological quality show no such change.
Teachers participate in professional learning activities to enhance their pedagogical knowledge and share best practices—and the increasing role of technologies in education, including social media, is shifting how this professional learning occurs. The COVID-19 pandemic provided an opportunity to consider the role of social media for professional learning. Using intensive longitudinal methods, we repeatedly surveyed 14 teachers’ use of social media both before and during the pandemic (N = 386 total responses). We found patterns in social media platforms uptake and their purposes, but teachers’ use of social media was largely idiosyncratic. Also, teachers demonstrated notable shifts in social media use after the pandemic started; multilevel models indicated that teachers were more likely to use social media to connect and share, especially, as well as learn and follow, compared with before the pandemic. Higher levels of COVID-19-related family stress were also associated with more use of social media to find materials.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.