A psychology of learning BASIC

ABSTRACT

This paper addresses the question: What does a person know following learning of BASIC programming? Several underlying conceptual structures are identified: (1) a transaction is an event that occurs in the computer and involves some operation on some object at some location, (2) a prestatement is a set of transactions corresponding to a line of code, (3) chunks are frequently occurring configurations of prestatements corresponding to several lines of code.

REFERENCES

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• 7: Mayer, R.E. A psychology of learning BASIC computer programming: Transactions, prestatements and chunks. Series in Learning and Cognition, Tech. Rep. No. 79-2, U. of Calif., Santa Barbara, Calif., 1979.
• 8: Mayer, R.E. Elaboration techniques and advance organizers that affect technical learning. To appear in J. o f Educational Psychol. 72, (1980).
• 9: Mayer, R.E., and Bromage, B. Different recall protocols for technical text due to sequencing of advance organizers. To appear in J. of Educational Psychol. 71 (1979).

INDEX TERMS

Keywords:
BASIC, instruction, learning