Research Agenda for Computer Science Education (original) (raw)
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Research methods in computer science education
ACM Sigcse Bulletin, 1993
This paper examines the nature and scope of computer science education (CSE) research. We first distinguish CSE research from other forms of educational research, outlining its aims and identity as a research discipline. In examining the state of the art of CSE research, we attempt to categorise past research studies into general themes, reflecting the diverse contributions to CSE made over the years. Further, we critique each category, highlighting possible benefits and limitations. We argue that there has been a lack of reference to pedagogical theory, underlying most past research studies. This has resulted in a failure to provide teachers with "pedagogical content knowledge", critical to gaining useful insights into cognitive and educational issues surrounding learning. We conclude by providing guidelines for CSE research, stressing the need for a stronger connection to the theoretical frameworks of education-related disciplines such as pedagogy, epistemology, curriculum studies and psychology.
A Case for Learning Research in Computer Science Education
As computer science education (CS Ed) research matures, CS Ed researchers need to take a step back and consider more foundational questions of what it means to know how to program. Along this journey we will need to use research frameworks and methodologies from learning research that help us better understand who our students are as learners and how that affect how they learn, their motivation for learning, and how best to support their learning. In particular, we need to gain a better understanding of the mental modes students build around important programming constructs and concepts and the meta-cognitive skill necessary for learning to program and consistent application of programming and computational thinking skills. Lastly, we need to develop an understanding of the differences between novice and experts to begin defining a computer science specific pedagogy that distinguishes between content knowledge we want students to know and the pedagogical content knowledge needed to support students’ learning that content. While a few researchers in the field have already begun to branch into these research directions, this research has not matured enough that everyone recognizes these works as foundational to all the other computer science education research we conduct. This paper was accepted for the NSF funded Future of Computer Science Education Summit hosted in Orlando, FL in January 2014.
A Methodological Review of Computer Science Education Research
2008
Methodological reviews have been used successfully to identify research trends and improve research practice in a variety of academic fields. Although there have been three methodological reviews of the emerging field of computer science education research, they lacked reliability or generalizability. Therefore, because of the capacity for a methodological review to improve practice in computer science education and because the previous methodological reviews were lacking, a large scale, reliable, and generalizable methodological review of the recent research on computer science education is reported here. Our overall research question, which has nine subquestions, involved the methodological properties of research reported in articles in major computer science education research forums from the years 2000-2005. T he purpose of this methodological review is to provide a methodologically rigorous basis on which to make recommendations for the improvement of computer science education research and to promote informed dialogue about its practice.
Computer Science Pedagogical Content Knowledge
ACM Transactions on Computing Education, 2019
Computer science education efforts are expanding across the globe to equip students with the necessary computing skills for today’s digital world. However, preparing students to become literate in computing activities requires the training of tens of thousands of teachers in computer science. The discrepancy between student needs and teacher preparation in computer science has raised questions of quality teachers, particularly for teachers who do not possess adequate content or pedagogical knowledge to teach computer science efficiently. To address this issue, we designed an instrument to measure knowledge needed to teach computer science (i.e., computer science pedagogical content knowledge). Results exhibited that our instrument measured aspects of teachers’ computer science pedagogical content knowledge; however, teachers’ prior background in teaching did not influence their performance. We discuss implications for future research and practice.
Towards a conceptualization of pedagogical content knowledge for computer science
Proceedings of the ninth annual international ACM conference on International computing education research, 2013
According to the current state of research, it seems uncontroversial that the Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) of teachers is a crucial factor for the success of teaching and learning in the context of many school subjects. Yet, the research about PCK in the subject of computer science (CS) is still sparse. Thus, we are working on a conceptualization of PCK for computer science (CS) that is based on literature on the one hand and empirically validated on the other. As a first step towards this goal, we have developed a category system from a set of publications from general pedagogy as well as from educational research in other subjects. Additionally, we have compared this system with the outcomes of a former survey among teachers about the preparation of lessons. Currently, we are coding all curricula for teacher education in Germany with this category system and preparing interviews among experts, applying the Critical Incident Technique.
The initiatives to introduce Computer Science as a manda- tory subject in K-12 in the U.S. (CSForAll), the U.K. (CAS), or Australia mean that thousands of new teachers will need to be trained both through inservice professional develop- ment and preservice teacher preparation. In order to exam- ine the success of these efforts to train new computer science teachers requires computer science education researchers to evaluate the development of knowledge to teach computer science, i.e. pedagogical content knowledge. To date, we know little about how computer science pedagogical content knowledge looks like and how to assess it. This paper re- ports results from a qualitative analysis of computer science teachers’ responses to teaching vignettes about students’ un- derstanding of programming constructs. The responses were evaluated using qualitative text analysis and commonalities are presented. In future research, the teachers’ knowledge related to programming errors will be investigated on the ba- sis of a survey developed from the answers of the presented study.
Measuring computer science pedagogical content knowledge
Proceedings of the 11th Workshop in Primary and Secondary Computing Education, 2016
The initiatives to introduce Computer Science as a mandatory subject in K-12 in the U.S. (CSForAll), the U.K. (CAS), or Australia mean that thousands of new teachers will need to be trained both through inservice professional development and preservice teacher preparation. In order to examine the success of these efforts to train new computer science teachers requires computer science education researchers to evaluate the development of knowledge to teach computer science, i.e. pedagogical content knowledge. To date, we know little about how computer science pedagogical content knowledge looks like and how to assess it. This paper reports results from a qualitative analysis of computer science teachers' responses to teaching vignettes about students' understanding of programming constructs. The responses were evaluated using qualitative text analysis and commonalities are presented. In future research, the teachers' knowledge related to programming errors will be investigated on the basis of a survey developed from the answers of the presented study. CCS Concepts •Social and professional topics → Computing education;
Questioning Two Myths in Computer Science Education
IFIP advances in information and communication technology, 2014
This paper examines two statements regarding computer science as a discipline and its theoretical basis. We shall demonstrate how those statements are questionable and in addition they tend to hide the real root-causes of some significant educational issues. Those statements are very popular in the scientific community and have noteworthy negative effect on the researchers who frequently double their efforts and get around the same problems for years. This work concludes with the claim that experts on computer science education (CSE) should be more attentive to the theoretical aspects of this discipline and should pay more attention to speculative proposals.
Describing Computer Science Education Research: An Academic
Changing conditions in universities include using new teaching models, and new technologies. The integration of new technology into computer science (CS) and Information Technology (IT) education programmes is often accompanied by studies which aim to understand and improve the teaching and learning process. How we evaluate the potential of emerging technologies and integrate them into teacher education has clearly become increasingly important.
Computer Science in the School Curriculum: Issues and Challenges
Tomorrow's Learning: Involving Everyone. Learning with and about Technologies and Computing, 2017
This paper is based on analysis and discussion undertaken over several years by researchers, policymakers and practitioners from a range of countries which vary in their approaches to the curriculum for Computer Science. The discussions, undertaken predominantly within the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP) and EDUsummIT communities were motivated by a need to examine the rationale, issues and challenges following some concerns across the globe about the position and nature of Computer Science in the school curriculum. We summarise our findings and focus specifically on challenges for the computer science education community in communicating, clarifying needs and promoting curriculum change in order to encourage Computer Science in the curriculum both theoretically and practically.