Determining the Effectiveness of the 3D Alice Programming Environment at the Computer Science I Level

Sykes, Edward R.

doi:10.2190/j175-q735-1345-270m

Cited by 53 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…It is evident from the previous discussion that IP courses have a long history of interventions to improve students' learning outcomes but high failure and dropout rates from them are consistently reported in different studies (Guzdial & Soloway, 2002;Lahtinen, Ala-Mutka, & Järvinen, 2005;Sykes, 2007;Watson & Li, 2014;Yadin, 2011;Zingaro, 2015). Therefore, it is important to address the issues of high failure and dropout rates because it affects the retention and recruitment of the students in the computer science discipline.…”

Section: Research Questionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, the final grades of the course over four semesters were compared against failure and dropout rates. This criterion was used in previous studies (Guzdial & Soloway, 2002;Lahtinen et al, 2005;Sykes, 2007;Yadin, 2011;Watson & Li, 2014;Zingaro, 2015) to report the students' performance. Figure 3 shows the failure rate for the last four semesters.…”

Section: Rq2: What Is the Impact Of The Adri Approach Compared To Thementioning

confidence: 99%

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Comparison of Traditional and ADRI Based Teaching Approaches in an Introductory Programming Course

Malik

Coldwell-Neilson

2017

JITE:Research

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Aim/PurposeThis study introduced a new teaching and learning approach based on an ADRI (Approach, Deployment, Result, Improvement) model in an introductory programming (IP) course. The effectiveness of the new teaching and learning process was determined by collecting feedback from the IP instructors and by analyzing the final exam grades of the course. Background Learning to program is considered a difficult and challenging task for a considerable number of novice programmers. As a result, high failure and dropout rates are often reported in IP courses. Different studies have been conducted to investigate the issue. One of the reasons for this challenge is the multiple skills that students have to master in order to be able to build programs. These skills include programming knowledge and problem-solving strategies and being able to pay equal attention to these required skills in the IP course. Methodology A focus group was conducted to obtain feedback from the IP instructors about the ADRI approach. The performance of the students who had completed the IP course before ADRI was compared with those who used the ADRI approach by undertaking a comparative analysis of their final exam grades. ContributionThe study demonstrates that the new teaching and learning approach based on the ADRI model encourages students to pay equal attention to programming knowledge and problem-solving strategies, discouraging programming shortcuts and reducing high attrition rates (failure and dropout) in the IP course. FindingsThe results of the focus group show that the instructors preferred the ADRI approach compared to the traditional approach. The final exam grades show that the students performed better in semesters which offered the ADRI approach as compared to those semesters without this approach. Comparison of Traditional and ADRI Based Teaching Approaches 268Future Research Future research will explore the ADRI approach in other fields of computer science studies, such as database and data structure, to determine if its impact has a wider application than just teaching introductory programming.

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Section: Research Questionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Rq2: What Is the Impact Of The Adri Approach Compared To Thementioning

confidence: 99%

Comparison of Traditional and ADRI Based Teaching Approaches in an Introductory Programming Course

Malik

Coldwell-Neilson

2017

JITE:Research

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“…Coping with high failing rate or dropout from the introductory programming course is a big challenge in computer science discipline [1], [2]. Different approaches have been proposed to improve the programming skills of novice programmers [3]- [6].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Self Review and External Review Model for Teaching and Assessing Novice Programmers

Iqbal¹,

Harsh²

2013

IJIET

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Abstract-Teaching and assessing programming skills in novice programmers is a challenging and difficult task. Most of the introductory programming courses emphasized in teaching programming knowledge (syntax and semantics of programming language to the novice programmers) instead of giving equal attention and time to problem solving strategies, analysis of output(results) and improvement in programming practices . Hence this paper makes an attempt to introduce ADRI model (well known quality assurance model for self review and external review) approach in preparing teaching and assessment materials in programming courses to novice programmers so that it ensures that programming knowledge and problem solving strategies are properly incorporated and practiced in teaching and assessing materials for novice programmers.Index Terms-Novice programmers, ADRI model, programming knowledge, problem solving strategies.

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“…No entanto, apesar de existirem estudos que apresentam resultados promissores nesta área (cf. Johnsgard & McDonald, 2008;Sykes, 2007;Wang, Mei, Lin, Chiu, & Lin, 2009;Zhang, Liu, &, Pablos, 2014) os instrumentos de recolha de dados utilizados variam significativamente, dificultando a possibilidade de retirar conclusões. Por exemplo, no estudo meta-analítico realizado por Costa e Miranda (2017), foi difícil comparar os resultados das investigações que visaram melhorar as competências de programação dos estudantes que se encontravam numa fase inicial de aprendizagem, não só porque foram usadas diferentes linguagens de programação, mas ainda porque a avaliação feita usou diferentes instrumentos de medida.…”

Section: Introductionunclassified

“…Por exemplo, no estudo meta-analítico realizado por Costa e Miranda (2017), foi difícil comparar os resultados das investigações que visaram melhorar as competências de programação dos estudantes que se encontravam numa fase inicial de aprendizagem, não só porque foram usadas diferentes linguagens de programação, mas ainda porque a avaliação feita usou diferentes instrumentos de medida. É o caso dos estudos de Wang, Mei, Lin, Chiu and Lin (2009) Sykes (2007), que utilizaram questionários, sendo o primeiro composto por 20 questões de escolha múltipla sobre conceitos de programação e o segundo por uma combinação de questões relacionadas com problemas de programação, umas fazendo apelo a conhecimentos, outras a competências e outras a resolução de problemas. Outras investigações usaram os resultados de provas académicas como medida de avaliação da aprendizagem inicial da programação (cf.…”

Section: Introductionunclassified

Desenvolvimento e validação de uma prova de avaliação das competências iniciais de programação

Costa

Miranda

2017

risti

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Resumo: Atualmente verifica-se a insuficiência de instrumentos de avaliação validados que possam mensurar as diferentes etapas de aprendizagem inicial de programação. Por este motivo desenvolvemos uma prova a partir da Taxonomia de Bloom que permite comparar o desempenho dos alunos independentemente da linguagem de programação com que iniciaram a sua aprendizagem. A prova apresenta questões de escolha múltipla para os quatro níveis iniciais e questões de desenvolvimento para os dois últimos níveis. Após a sua construção, foi validada por 12 especialistas e submetida a um grupo-piloto (N=29) para analisar a fiabilidade e dificuldade dos itens. Obtivemos um alfa de 0,837 e correlação positiva entre todos os itens da prova e o total dos itens com nível de significância p<0,05. As diferenças entre a frequência de respostas corretas nos itens são estatisticamente significativas (Q(12)=76,767; n=29; p=0,000). Estes resultados demonstram que a prova é válida, fiável e discriminativa.Palavras-chave: Programação Inicial; Taxonomia de Bloom; Desempenho; Validação; Fiabilidade Development and Validation of an Assessment Instrument of the Initial Programming SkillsAbstract: Nowadays there is a noticeable lack of validated evaluation instruments that can measure the different stages of initial programming learning. For this reason, we developed an instrument from Bloom's Taxonomy that allows to compare the students' performance regardless of the programming language with which they started their learning. The instrument presents multiple choice questions for the first four levels and open-ended questions for the last two levels. After its construction, it was validated by 12 specialists and submitted to a pilotgroup (N=29) to analyze the items' reliability and difficulty. We obtained an alpha of 0,837 and positive correlation between al the test's items and the total of items with a significance level of p<0,05. The differences between the frequency of correct answers in the items are statistically significative (Q(12) =76,767; n=29; p=0,000). These results demonstrate that the test is valid, reliable and discriminative.

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Determining the Effectiveness of the 3D Alice Programming Environment at the Computer Science I Level

Cited by 53 publications

References 10 publications

Comparison of Traditional and ADRI Based Teaching Approaches in an Introductory Programming Course

Comparison of Traditional and ADRI Based Teaching Approaches in an Introductory Programming Course

A Self Review and External Review Model for Teaching and Assessing Novice Programmers

Desenvolvimento e validação de uma prova de avaliação das competências iniciais de programação

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