Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Education Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 21 of 21

Full-Text Articles in Education

Teaching Software Development For Real-World Problems Using A Microservice-Based Collaborative Problem-Solving Approach, Yi Meng Lau, Christian Michael Koh, Lingxiao Jiang Apr 2024

Teaching Software Development For Real-World Problems Using A Microservice-Based Collaborative Problem-Solving Approach, Yi Meng Lau, Christian Michael Koh, Lingxiao Jiang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Experienced and skillful software developers are needed in organizations to develop software products effective for their business with shortened time-to-market. Such developers will not only need to code but also be able to work in teams and collaboratively solve real-world problems that organizations arefacing. It is challenging for educators to nurture students to become such developers with strong technical, social, and cognitive skills. Towards addressing the challenge, this study presents a Collaborative Software Development Project Framework for a course that focuses on learning microservices architectures anddeveloping a software application for a real-world business. Students get to work in teams to …


Conceptthread: Visualizing Threaded Concepts In Mooc Videos, Zhiguang Zhou, Li Ye, Lihong Cai, Lei Wang, Yigang Wang, Yongheng Wang, Wei Chen, Yong Wang Jan 2024

Conceptthread: Visualizing Threaded Concepts In Mooc Videos, Zhiguang Zhou, Li Ye, Lihong Cai, Lei Wang, Yigang Wang, Yongheng Wang, Wei Chen, Yong Wang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) platforms are becoming increasingly popular in recent years. Online learners need to watch the whole course video on MOOC platforms to learn the underlying new knowledge, which is often tedious and time-consuming due to the lack of a quick overview of the covered knowledge and their structures. In this paper, we propose ConceptThread , a visual analytics approach to effectively show the concepts and the relations among them to facilitate effective online learning. Specifically, given that the majority of MOOC videos contain slides, we first leverage video processing and speech analysis techniques, including shot recognition, …


How Helpful Do Novice Programmers Find The Feedback Of An Automated Repair Tool?, Oka Kurniawan, Christopher M. Poskitt, Ismam Al Hoque, Norman Tiong Seng Lee, Cyrille Jégourel, Nachamma Sockalingam Dec 2023

How Helpful Do Novice Programmers Find The Feedback Of An Automated Repair Tool?, Oka Kurniawan, Christopher M. Poskitt, Ismam Al Hoque, Norman Tiong Seng Lee, Cyrille Jégourel, Nachamma Sockalingam

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Immediate feedback has been shown to improve student learning. In programming courses, immediate, automated feedback is typically provided in the form of pre-defined test cases run by a submission platform. While these are excellent for highlighting the presence of logical errors, they do not provide novice programmers enough scaffolding to help them identify where an error is or how to fix it. To address this, several tools have been developed that provide richer feedback in the form of program repairs. Studies of such tools, however, tend to focus more on whether correct repairs can be generated, rather than how novices …


Evaluating Methods For Students To Identify And Clarify Doubts In Computing Design Courses, Eng Lieh Ouh, Benjamin Gan Oct 2020

Evaluating Methods For Students To Identify And Clarify Doubts In Computing Design Courses, Eng Lieh Ouh, Benjamin Gan

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This full paper evaluates the effectiveness of doubts identification and clarification methods applied in undergraduate computing design courses. Many undergraduate courses in computing require students to understand abstract design concepts. Exposed to the design concepts for the first time, students need to be able to identify and clarify their doubts about the abstract concepts in order to make the right design decisions. In this study, we seek to evaluate the effectiveness of six methods that help students to identify and clarify their doubts. These methods vary in their timing (immediate or delayed), communication style (online or face-to-face) and participation style …


Applying Case-Based Learning For A Postgraduate Software Architecture Course, Eng Lieh Ouh, Yunghans Irawan Jul 2019

Applying Case-Based Learning For A Postgraduate Software Architecture Course, Eng Lieh Ouh, Yunghans Irawan

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Software architecture remains a difficult subject for learners to grasp and for educators to teach given its level of abstraction. On the other hand, case-based learning (CBL) is a popular teaching approach used across disciplines especially in business, medicine and law where students work in groups apply their knowledge to solve real-world case studies, or scenarios using their reasoning skills and existing theoretical knowledge. In this paper, we provide how we apply case-based learning to address the challenge in teaching a postgraduate software architecture course. Our learners are postgraduate students taking a master’s program in software engineering. We first describe …


Applying Design Thinking To Student Outreach Projects: Experiences From An Information Systems School, Swapna Gottipati, Venky Shankararaman, Alan Megargel Dec 2018

Applying Design Thinking To Student Outreach Projects: Experiences From An Information Systems School, Swapna Gottipati, Venky Shankararaman, Alan Megargel

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

As countries turn into Smart Nations, Infocom Technology plays a key role in enhancing their competitiveness through high skilled workforces. Reaching to younger generations and attracting them to computing programs such as Information Systems (IS) and Computer Science (CS) is a key challenge faced by universities. Many high quality students from junior colleges either don’t choose IS programs or choose IS programs as their last option during the application process. A School of Information Systems (SIS) from a large metropolitan university decided to implement an innovative outreach program to attract high quality high school aka Junior College (JC) students. JC …


Effectiveness Of Physical Robot Versus Robot Simulator In Teaching Introductory Programming, Oka Kurniawan, Norman Tiong Seng Lee, Subhajit Datta, Nachamma Sockalingam, Pey Lin Leong Dec 2018

Effectiveness Of Physical Robot Versus Robot Simulator In Teaching Introductory Programming, Oka Kurniawan, Norman Tiong Seng Lee, Subhajit Datta, Nachamma Sockalingam, Pey Lin Leong

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This study reports the use of a physical robot and robot simulator in an introductory programming course in a university and measures students' programming background conceptual learning gain and learning experience. One group used physical robots in their lessons to complete programming assignments, while the other group used robot simulators. We are interested in finding out if there is any difference in the learning gain and experiences between those that use physical robots as compared to robot simulators. Our results suggest that there is no significant difference in terms of students' learning between the two approaches. However, the control group …


Vt-Revolution: Interactive Programming Tutorials Made Possible, Lingfeng Bao, Zhenchang Xing, Xin Xia, David Lo, Shanping Li Nov 2018

Vt-Revolution: Interactive Programming Tutorials Made Possible, Lingfeng Bao, Zhenchang Xing, Xin Xia, David Lo, Shanping Li

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Programming video tutorials showcase programming tasks and associated workflows. Although video tutorials are easy to create, it isoften difficult to explore the captured workflows and interact withthe programs in the videos. In this work, we propose a tool named VTRevolution – an interactive programming video tutorial authoring system. VTRevolution has two components: 1) a tutorial authoring system leverages operating system level instrumentation to log workflow history while tutorial authors are creating programming video tutorials; 2) a tutorial watching system enhances the learning experience of video tutorials by providing operation history and timeline-based browsing interactions. Our tutorial authoring system does not …


Exploring Experiential Learning Model And Risk Management Process For An Undergraduate Software Architecture Course, Eng Lieh Ouh, Yunghans Irawan Oct 2018

Exploring Experiential Learning Model And Risk Management Process For An Undergraduate Software Architecture Course, Eng Lieh Ouh, Yunghans Irawan

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper shares our insights on exploring theexperiential learning model and risk management process todesign an undergraduate software architecture course. The keychallenge for undergraduate students to appreciate softwarearchitecture design is usually their limited experience in thesoftware industry. In software architecture, the high-level designprinciples are heuristics lacking the absoluteness of firstprinciples which for inexperienced undergraduate students, thisis a frustrating divergence from what they used to value. From aneducator's perspective, teaching software architecture requirescontending with the problem of how to express this level ofabstraction practically and also make the learning realistic. Inthis paper, we propose a model adapting the concepts ofexperiential learning …


Competency Analytics Tool: Analyzing Curriculum Using Course Competencies, Swapna Gottipati, Venky Shankararaman Jan 2018

Competency Analytics Tool: Analyzing Curriculum Using Course Competencies, Swapna Gottipati, Venky Shankararaman

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The applications of learning outcomes and competency frameworks have brought better clarity to engineering programs in many universities. Several frameworks have been proposed to integrate outcomes and competencies into course design, delivery and assessment. However, in many cases, competencies are course-specific and their overall impact on the curriculum design is unknown. Such impact analysis is important for analyzing, discovering gaps and improving the curriculum design. Unfortunately, manual analysis is a painstaking process due to large amounts of competencies across the curriculum. In this paper, we propose an automated method to analyze the competencies and discover their impact on the overall …


Seeking Independent Management Of Problem Behavior: A Proof-Of-Concept Study With Children And Their Teachers, Camellia Zakaria, Richard C. Davis, Zachary Walker Jun 2016

Seeking Independent Management Of Problem Behavior: A Proof-Of-Concept Study With Children And Their Teachers, Camellia Zakaria, Richard C. Davis, Zachary Walker

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Problem behaviors are particularly common in children with neurodevelopmental disorders like Autism and Down syndrome. These behaviors sometimes discourage social inclusion, inhibit learning development, and cause severe injuries, but caregivers are often unable to attend to their children immediately when the behaviors occur. Recent research shows that problem behavior can be automatically detected with wearable devices, but it is still not clear how to reduce caregivers' burdens and facilitate academic, social, and functional development of children with problem behaviors. We conducted a field study at a school with 21 children who exhibit problem behaviors and found that they needed frequent …


Demo: Wearable Application To Manage Problem Behavior In Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders, Camellia Zakaria, Richard C. Davis Jun 2016

Demo: Wearable Application To Manage Problem Behavior In Children With Neurodevelopmental Disorders, Camellia Zakaria, Richard C. Davis

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Managing problem behaviors in children with neurodevelopmental disorders can be challenging. Such behaviors may discourage social participation and learning. Many of these behaviors warrant intervention, however, are challenging for caregivers to constantly supervise. Previous work focused on developing recognition systems for stereotypical and aggressive behaviors. Researchers also developed visualization interface for caregivers to better understand their child’s needs. Our goal however, is to design an independent behavior management application to help children manage problem behaviors with minimal supervision.We conducted a field study at a school for children with special needs in Singapore, and interviewed ten teachers. This study helped us …


Enabling National Software Development Competitions To Identify And Enhance Student Mentor Capability In Singapore, Chris Boesch, Sandra Boesch Oct 2014

Enabling National Software Development Competitions To Identify And Enhance Student Mentor Capability In Singapore, Chris Boesch, Sandra Boesch

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The authors previously developed a system to facilitate the self-directed learning and practicing of software languages in Singapore. One of the goals of this self-directed learning was to enable the creation of student mentors who would be able to assist other students during classroom sessions. Building on this work, the authors extended the platform to support the promotion and coordination of multiple programming competitions including multiple schools systems within Singapore with the goals of identifying, enabling, and mentoring students who might be better prepared to mentor their peers at their school after participating in the country wide competition. This paper …


Automated Mentor Assignment In Blended Learning Environments, Chris Boesch, Kevin Steppe Apr 2014

Automated Mentor Assignment In Blended Learning Environments, Chris Boesch, Kevin Steppe

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper we discuss the addition of automatic assignment of mentors during inclass lab work to an existing online platform for programing practice. SingPath is an web based tool for users to practice programming in several software languages. The platform started as a tool to provide students with online feedback on solutions to programming problems and expanded over time to support different of blended learning needs for a variety of classes and classroom settings. The SingPath platform supports traditional self-directed learning mechanisms such as badges and completion metrics as well as features for use in classrooms, such as tournaments. …


Teaching Analysis Of Software Designs Using Dependency Graph, Kevin Steppe Apr 2014

Teaching Analysis Of Software Designs Using Dependency Graph, Kevin Steppe

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We present the use of a new type of dependency graph to aid students in analyzing the modifiability of software designs. Though a variety of software design concepts, such as information hiding, separation of concerns and patterns are taught to undergraduate students, they often have difficulty applying these concepts to the analysis of designs and particularly to comparing designs, perhaps due to the subjective nature of these concepts. Our new technique complements design structure matrix and ‘uses’ techniques to handle asymmetric dependency impacts and provide a deterministic approach to comparing alternative designs. A major goal of this technique was for …


Livelabs: Building An In-Situ Real-Time Mobile Experimentation Testbed, Rajesh Krishna Balan, Archan Misra, Youngki Lee Feb 2014

Livelabs: Building An In-Situ Real-Time Mobile Experimentation Testbed, Rajesh Krishna Balan, Archan Misra, Youngki Lee

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We present LiveLabs, a mobile experimentation testbed that is currently deployed across our university campus with further deployments at a large shopping mall, a commercial airport, and a resort island soon to follow. The key goal of LiveLabs is to allow in-situ real-time experimentation of mobile applications and services that require context-specific triggers with real participants on their actual smart phones. We describe how LiveLabs works, and then explain the novel R&D required to realise it. We end with a descriptionof the current LiveLabs status (> 700 active participants to date) as well as present some key lessons learned.


Adaptive Gameplay For Programming Practice, Chris Boesch, Sandra Boesch Oct 2013

Adaptive Gameplay For Programming Practice, Chris Boesch, Sandra Boesch

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Over the past four years, we have collaborated to develop a set of online games to enable users to practice software languages in a self-directed manner and as part of a class. Recently we introduced a new adaptive difficulty feature that enables players to self-regulate the difficulty of the games they are playing to practice. These new features also provide additional information to further adapt the problem content to better meet the needs of the users.


Student Usage Patterns And Perceptions For Differentiated Lab Exercises In An Undergraduate Programming Course, Heng Ngee Mok May 2012

Student Usage Patterns And Perceptions For Differentiated Lab Exercises In An Undergraduate Programming Course, Heng Ngee Mok

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Differentiated instruction in the form of tiered take-home lab exercises was implemented for students of an undergraduate-level programming course. This paper attempts to uncover the perceptions and usage patterns of students toward these new lab exercises using a comprehensive survey. Findings reveal that these tiered exercises are generally very well received and preferred over their traditional "one size fits all" counter-parts. Although the study does not show that tiered exercises have improved proÞciency or scores, it does seem to indicate higher student engagement and motivation levels. Based on the survey results, a list of recommendations is put forth for the …


Setting Up A Low-Cost Lab Management System For A Multi-Purpose Computing Laboratory Using Virtualisation Technology, Heng Ngee Mok, Wee Kiat Tan Apr 2012

Setting Up A Low-Cost Lab Management System For A Multi-Purpose Computing Laboratory Using Virtualisation Technology, Heng Ngee Mok, Wee Kiat Tan

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper describes how a generic computer laboratory equipped with 52 workstations is set up for teaching IT-related courses and other general purpose usage. The authors have successfully constructed a lab management system based on decentralised, client-side software virtualisation technology using Linux and free software tools from VMware that fulfils the requirements of fast "switch over" time between consecutive lab sessions, the ability to support a wide range of IT courses and usage scenarios, low cost, easy maintenance, and a sandboxed environment for potentially disruptive IT security lab exercises. Sufficient implementation details are provided so that readers can build a …


Case Study On Using A Programming Practice Tool For Evaluating University Applicants, Shannon Christopher Boesch, Kevin Steppe Dec 2011

Case Study On Using A Programming Practice Tool For Evaluating University Applicants, Shannon Christopher Boesch, Kevin Steppe

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We used a programming practice tool to test basic programming skills of prospective students. A live competition was used to test those skills. Students who did well were asked for further interviews. Most students had no prior background and reported learning the basics of two programming languages within two weeks of self-study.


Multiple Representation For Understanding Data Structures, Biffah Hancies, Venky Shankararaman, Jose Munoz Aug 1997

Multiple Representation For Understanding Data Structures, Biffah Hancies, Venky Shankararaman, Jose Munoz

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper an approach to enhance the learning of abstract computing concepts by novice students is presented. This approach is based on effective use of multiple visual representations, and it was applied within the domain of linear data structures: array, stack, queue and linked list. A prototype computer-based instructional system called MRUDS (Multiple Representation for Understanding Data Structures) was developed and evaluated. It was found from the evaluation that the three presentation modules namely, analogy, representation and algorithm contributed to the students' learning process, each contributing to and reinforcing the effect of the others.