Maria Kallia

University of Glasgow | UofG

Automating software testing activities can increase the quality and drastically decrease the cost of software development. Towards this direction various automated test data generation tools have been developed. The majority of them aim at branch testing, while a quite limited number aim at a higher level of testing thoroughness such as mutation. I...

In this paper we investigate whether computer programming has an impact on high school student’s reasoning skills, problem solving and self-efficacy in Mathematics. The quasi-experimental design was adopted to implement the study. The sample of the research comprised 66 high school students separated into two groups, the experimental and the contro...

Background and Context: Since the surge of grounded cognition (GC) theories in cognitive psychology, many studies have focused on demonstrating the importance of embodiment and sensorimotor activities on students’ conceptual development. In computing education particularly, the influence of grounded cognition can be traced mostly in the use of unpl...

Computing science (CS) classrooms, whether at school or university level, provide a useful context for examining disparities in participation: particular groups – especially females – remain underrepresented. Among the factors that influence retention in CS are those associated with motivation. In this study, we investigate why students drop CS by...

This module aims to provide prospective teachers with a concrete understanding of computational thinking (CT), working knowledge of teaching and learning principles for CT, and to introduce them to computational tools that can support teaching and learning. The Module is based on the work within the project “Future Teachers Education: Computationa...

Argumentation, as the generation and evaluation of arguments is critical in our ability to reason. Computing education research has long highlighted the relation between reasoning ability and programming skills but, to our knowledge, the relation between argumentative reasoning, and particularly collective argumentative reasoning, and programming h...

Concerns about participation in computer science at all levels of education continue to rise, despite the substantial efforts of research, policy, and world-wide education initiatives. In this paper, which is guided by a systematic literature review, we investigate the issue of inequalities in participation by bringing a theoretical lens from the s...

Threshold concepts have been characterised in the literature as jewels in the curriculum as they can inform teaching and learning practices. Therefore, identifying and addressing threshold concepts in any discipline is critical. The aim of the current study is to explore the existence of threshold concepts in computer programming and specifically w...

Recently, computational thinking has attracted much research attention, especially within primary and secondary education settings. However, incorporating computational thinking (CT) in mathematics or other disciplines is not a straightforward process and introduces many challenges concerning the way disciplines are organised and taught in school....

Computational thinking (CT) has gained much attention over the last decades. Because of its strong focus on problem solving, CT has the potential to contribute to mathematical problem solving and mathematical thinking. Therefore, CT might fruitfully be addressed in mathematics education. How to do so in mathematics education practice, however, is l...

Threshold concepts, as introduced by Meyer and Land (2003), have been the focus of many studies which aim to explore and understand students’ conceptual difficulties within the disciplines. In computer programming specifically, these efforts focus on higher education and concentrate mostly on the broad area of programming. Now that programming is i...

In technology-rich mathematics education, teachers nowadays experience the challenge to foster both mathematical thinking and computational thinking. To address this issue, the main research question is: How can a teaching-learning strategy, focusing on the use of digital tools, support 16-17 years old pre-university students in developing computat...

Background and Context: Vygotsky's sociocultural theory emphasises the importance of language, mediation, and the transfer of skills and knowledge from the social into the cognitive plane. This perspective has influenced the development of PRIMM (Predict, Run, Investigate, Modify, Make), a structured approach to teaching programming. Objective: The...

Computer programming is one of the most researched subjects within computer science education; within this much attention has been focused on exploring the difficulties and common misconceptions that students experience when learning to program. The study reported here has two aims: firstly, to investigate students’ misconceptions around functions...

PRIMM is an approach to teaching programming at K-12 that facilitates the structure of lessons in a purposeful way. PRIMM stands for Predict-Run-Investigate-Modify-Make, and draws on recent research in programming education. In particular the PRIMM approach recognises that starting with existing code and being able to explain what it does gives nov...

Computer programming is regarded as a difficult subject at both school and university. There have been a vast amount of studies with a focus on identifying students’ difficulties, common errors and misconceptions in programming, and on the development and design of instructional techniques that could potentially help students overcome these difficu...

This chapter gives a general introduction to assessment for learning and applies this to the teaching of computing in school, with reference to recent research studies in this area. A variety of methods that can be used for assessment are discussed including self and peer assessment, automated tools, rubrics, concept maps and multiplechoice questio...

https://royalsociety.org/~/media/policy/projects/computing-education/assessment-literature-review.pdf

With the introduction of the new computing curriculum in England, teachers are facing many challenges, among them the teaching of computer programming. Literature suggests that the conceptual understanding of this subject contributes to its difficulty and that threshold concepts, as a source of troublesome knowledge, have a significant role in this...