What does it take to learn 'programming thinking'?

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What does it take to learn 'programming thinking'?

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International Computing Education Research Workshop archive
Proceedings of the first international workshop on Computing education research table of contents

Seattle, WA, USA

Pages: 135 - 142

Year of Publication: 2005

ISBN:1-59593-043-4

Authors

Anna Eckerdal	Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
Michael Thuné	Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
Anders Berglund	Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden

Sponsors

ACM: Association for Computing Machinery
SIGCSE: ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education

Publisher

ACM New York, NY, USA

Bibliometrics

Downloads (6 Weeks): 13, Downloads (12 Months): 103, Citation Count: 12

Additional Information:

abstract references cited by index terms review collaborative colleagues

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ABSTRACT

What is 'programming thinking'? In a study, first year students were interviewed on their understanding of what learning to program means. Many students talked about learning to program in terms of learning a special way to think, different from other subjects studied. Many of these students had problems in describing what this special way to think included. The analysis of the interviews revealed some features of this thinking, as expressed by the students. In this paper we discuss and analyse 'programming thinking' using phenomenography as our research approach [7]. Our results are coherent with Hazzan's research on the learning theory 'process-object duality' [4], but points to problems in learning of object-oriented programming not indicated in 'process-object duality'. In comparing the results form our own study with this learning theory, we discuss what this might mean in learning object-oriented programming.

REFERENCES

Note: OCR errors may be found in this Reference List extracted from the full text article. ACM has opted to expose the complete List rather than only correct and linked references.

	1	A. Berglund. Learning computer systems in a disributed project course. The what, why, how and where. PhD thesis, Uppsala University, Department of Information Technology, 2005.
	2	S. A. Booth. Learning to Program. A phenomenographic perspective. Number 89 in Göteborg Studies in Educational Science. Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis, Göteborg, Sweden, 1992.
	3	C. Bruce, C. McMahon, L. Buckingham, J. Hynd, M. Roggenkamp, and I. Stoodly. Ways of experiencing the act of learning to program: A phenomenographic study of introductory programming students at university. Journal of Information Technology Education, 3:143--160, 2004.
	4	O. Hazzan. How students attempt to reduce abstraction in the learning of computer science. Computer Science Education, 13(2):95--122, 2003.
	5	M. Kölling. The problem of teaching object-oriented programming, part i: Languages. JOURNAL OF OBJECT-ORIENTED PROGRAMMING, January 1999.
	6	S. Kvale. InterViews: An introduction to qualitative research interviewing. Sage, 1996.
	7	F. Marton and S. Booth. Learning and Awareness. Lawrence Erlbaum Ass., Mahwah, NJ, 1997.
	8	Eric Roberts, The dream of a common language: the search for simplicity and stability in computer science education, Proceedings of the 35th SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education, March 03-07, 2004, Norfolk, Virginia, USA
	9	A. Sfard. On the dual nature of mathematical conceptions: Reflections on processes and objects as different sides of the same coin. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 22:1--36, 1991.

CITED BY 12

	Anders Berglund , Mattias Wiggberg, Students learn CS in different ways: insights from an empirical study, Proceedings of the tenth conference on Australasian computing education, January 01-01, 2008, Wollongong, NSW, Australia
	Anders Berglund , Mattias Wiggberg, Students learn CS in different ways: insights from an empirical study, ACM SIGCSE Bulletin, v.38 n.3, September 2006
	Raymond Lister , Anders Berglund , Tony Clear , Joe Bergin , Kathy Garvin-Doxas , Brian Hanks , Lew Hitchner , Andrew Luxton-Reilly , Kate Sanders , Carsten Schulte , Jacqueline L. Whalley, Research perspectives on the objects-early debate, ACM SIGCSE Bulletin, v.38 n.4, December 2006
	Jerry Mead , Simon Gray , John Hamer , Richard James , Juha Sorva , Caroline St. Clair , Lynda Thomas, A cognitive approach to identifying measurable milestones for programming skill acquisition, ACM SIGCSE Bulletin, v.38 n.4, December 2006
	Ioanna Stamouli , Meriel Huggard, Object oriented programming and program correctness: the students' perspective, Proceedings of the 2006 international workshop on Computing education research, September 09-10, 2006, Canterbury, United Kingdom
	Ronit Ben-Bassat Levy , Mordechai Ben-Ari, We work so hard and they don't use it: acceptance of software tools by teachers, ACM SIGCSE Bulletin, v.39 n.3, September 2007
	Raymond Lister , Anders Berglund , Ilona Box , Chris Cope , Arnold Pears , Chris Avram , Mat Bower , Angela Carbone , Bill Davey , Michael de Raadt , Bernard Doyle , Sue Fitzgerald , Linda Mannila , Cat Kutay , Mia Peltomäki , Judy Sheard , Simon , Ken Sutton , Des Traynor , Jodi Tutty , Anne Venables, Differing ways that computing academics understand teaching, Proceedings of the ninth Australasian conference on Computing education, p.97-106, January 30-February 02, 2007, Ballarat, Victoria, Australia
	Päivi Kinnunen , Robert McCartney , Laurie Murphy , Lynda Thomas, Through the eyes of instructors: a phenomenographic investigation of student success, Proceedings of the third international workshop on Computing education research, September 15-16, 2007, Atlanta, Georgia, USA
	S. Simon , Angela Carbone , Michael de Raadt , Raymond Lister , Margaret Hamilton , Judy Sheard, Classifying computing education papers: process and results, Proceeding of the fourth international workshop on Computing education research, p.161-172, September 06-07, 2008, Sydney, Australia
	Carol Zander , Lynda Thomas , Beth Simon , Laurie Murphy , Renée McCauley , Brian Hanks , Sue Fitzgerald, Learning styles: novices decide, ACM SIGCSE Bulletin, v.41 n.3, September 2009
	Judy Sheard , S. Simon , Margaret Hamilton , Jan Lönnberg, Analysis of research into the teaching and learning of programming, Proceedings of the fifth international workshop on Computing education research workshop, August 10-11, 2009, Berkeley, CA, USA
	Juha Sorva, The same but different students' understandings of primitive and object variables, Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Computing Education Research, November 13-16, 2008, Koli, Finland

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
K. Computing Milieux
K.3 COMPUTERS AND EDUCATION
K.3.2 Computer and Information Science Education
Subjects: Computer science education

Additional Classification:
D. Software
D.1 PROGRAMMING TECHNIQUES
D.1.5 Object-oriented Programming

Keywords:
levels of abstraction, phenomenography, process-object duality

REVIEW

"Ann E. Fleury : Reviewer"

One student said, "It is the understanding of how the programming language is built" (page 137). Another student said, "You have a problem that you solve in different ways, and then you perhaps find the best way" (page 139). These are two very dif more...

Collaborative Colleagues:

Anna Eckerdal: colleagues

Michael Thuné: colleagues

Anders Berglund: colleagues

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