Teaching and learning data structure concepts via Visual Kinesthetic Pseudocode with the aid of a constructively aligned app

Abstract

Data Structures is an integral topic for any Computer Science or Software Engineering degree, identified as a Core Tier-1 topic of the ACM/IEEE Computer Science Curricula. The underlying concepts are inherently abstract, making them especially difficult to understand for novice programmers. This paper proposes a cognitively challenging technique to help students understand the thought process that the learning outcomes of fundamental data structure units aim to achieve. The development of this thought process is using a technique we term Visual Kinesthetic Pseudocode, with the overarching goal of helping students code without coding, yet providing the necessary scaffold to guide them in implementing the data structures with real code. This was implemented in the form of InteractiveDS, an app for students and teachers to guide the learning of fundamental data structure concepts. The evaluations demonstrate that students strongly credited InteractiveDS in aiding their understanding of concepts and confidence in applying data structure concepts in practice. The study is also a step forward in revealing potential threshold concepts pertaining to data structure modules.

Smartphone Apps for Teaching Engineering Courses: Experience and Scope

“…In the last 5 years, we have seen some good apps being developed and used as instructional aid for teaching various engineering courses. We believe that more such apps will be developed and used in the near future as envisioned by Odisho et al. (2016).…”

“…The apps can be classified into those supporting simulation and those facilitating experimentation (Figure 2). The simulation-related apps help students to design solutions of problems (Chuda et al., 2015) and visualize algorithms (Boticki et al., 2013; Odisho et al., 2016). Alternatively, an app may assist students in performing experiments (Crespo et al., 2016; Gómez-Tejedor et al., 2015; Rodriguez-Sanchez et al., 2015; Zhao et al., 2017) or provide information that helps them to perform experiments (Guerrero et al., 2016; Monroy Reyes et al., 2016).…”

“…Students felt that these apps helped them to learn better (Boticki et al., 2013; Guerrero et al., 2016; Monroy Reyes et al., 2016; Odisho et al., 2016; Zhao et al., 2017) and using them also made them more confident (Odisho et al., 2016). Students appreciated the fact that educational software was available to them in the form of smartphone apps (Boticki et al., 2013; Gómez-Tejedor et al., 2015; Zhao et al., 2017) and expected the user interface to be intuitive and interactive (Boticki et al., 2013; Monroy Reyes et al., 2016; Odisho et al., 2016; Zhao et al., 2017). Although all the apps are free, most of them have been used only in the universities where they have been developed.…”

“…Odisho, Aziz, and Giacaman (2016) developed a smartphone app named InteractiveDS to teach an introductory course on data structures. A course on data structures is invariably included in an undergraduate computer science program.…”

A systematic literature review of student engagement in software visualization: a theoretical perspective

“…In Végh and Takáč (2017)'s study, the constructive learning theory was used to make a design decision to select interactive activities. On the other hand, several studies have used cognitivism to support their design decision for constructing an artifact or for the purposes of analysis (Hall et al, 2013;Moreno et al, 2014;Odisho et al, 2016). Instead, to get the largest benefit of SV for the students, they should be more actively engaged with the technology.…”