Executive SummaryWith universities having difficulty attracting students to study information technology (IT), the scores needed for entry into IT degrees have dropped markedly. IT schools are thus having to cope by adjusting their introductory courses to ensure that students will still learn what is expected but without negatively impacting on pass rates. This paper considers short objective tests, designed by other researchers, to examine whether students who have passed an introductory course have achieved an understanding of fundamental concepts in programming. The Dehnadi test, which was originally designed to be taken before a programming course to predict who would be successful, proved to be useful in showing that many students who had passed an introductory programming course had little or no understanding of fundamental concepts. The test was useful if the number of correct responses was considered. Implications of students passing an introductory course but being unable to respond correctly on a multiple choice test of the most fundamental concepts of programming are considered.
<p>Despite rapid changes in the ways in which university courses are being delivered, lectures have remained a common feature of many courses. The lecture is problematic for many reasons, not the least being that it does not encourage interaction. The current project attempted to address this problem by implementing 'digital ink' into lecture sessions. The approach used in this study is innovative because the handwritten component of the content was written on top of content created in advance and presented in PDF form. The response from students was overwhelmingly positive. During the course of the implementation, a number of teething problems were encountered; suggestions for overcoming these problems and future enhancements are also discussed. Digital ink provides a potential avenue for increasing interaction in lecture sessions whilst not limiting the capacity for capturing all aspects of the session.</p><br />
One of the challenges that commencing university students in computing degree programs face is the difficulty in engaging with the abstract and complicated theories in the computing discipline. In particular, it is hard for beginner computer architecture students to visualise the link between the theory of digital logic and the behaviour of the digital circuitry. Studies have shown that improving disciplinary engagement can lead to lower student attrition rates. We aim to increase student engagement in an introductory computer architecture course by employing oversized physical logic gates in the form of logic blocks in several digital logic experiments. Using these digital logic blocks students will be able to physically interact with the circuitry and observe the outcomes of their solutions directly. Student survey results indicate that using the physical logic blocks was helpful to beginner computing students in gaining a better understanding of digital logic and digital circuits. The use of physical logic blocks was also helpful in transitioning to a more abstract digital logic drawing environment later in the course for building more advanced digital circuits.
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