From Concrete to Abstract: Motivating Contexts for Novice Programmers
- 1. { From Concrete to Abstract: Motivating Contexts For Novice Programmers Some rights reserved by caitlinburke Some rights reserved by Mark Fischer
- 2. Talking about Why and how we contextualise programming What we do to encourage deeper understanding How we assess what pupils can do independently What we would like to do better
- 3. Programming is difficult Programming can be difficult
- 5. Why Animation then 2D Games?
- 7. Concepts and blocks mostly used for animation
- 9. New concepts and blocks mostly used in games
- 11. English Description CS Speak Programming Language Levels of Abstraction Vague and Implicit Precise and Explicit
- 12. Show the execution of the program then pupils describe the behaviour. Show the execution of a buggy previous example. How do we fix this? Predict what a particular script will do that has one or two new ideas in it. Written challenges based around particular concepts. Activities We Use To Develop Understanding
- 13. How To Assess This?
- 14. Create a more open ended challenge
- 15. Give them something to aim at
- 16. Let them go off-piste if they want to
- 17. Illustrate levels of performance in pupil friendly language Include space for more open ended comments Assess the process and product Keep the assessment flexible
- 18. Example criteria for Animation creation
- 19. Example criteria for Game creation assessment
- 20. What We’d Like To Do Better
- 21. Questions?
Editor's Notes
- #3: Why and how we contextualise programming What we do to encourage deeper understanding How we assess programming skills What we would like to do better
- #4: The last time I checked it was still listed as one of the grand challenges in Computing Education. Some pupils take to it like a duck to water and then there’s a large proportion of pupils who just don’t. In the past our approach appears to have been a bit like getting students to immediately climb a very high mountain when they haven’t even climbed a set of stairs or “here’s a pen, this is how you dip it in some ink and make a mark on the page now write a Shakespearean sonnet”. A program executing is like an invisible hand; we can’t see the computation directly, only the output it creates for us. Tracing tools can help pupils to create the link between the static code and the dynamic execution but they only go so far. When I teach our programming based units I’m always trying to build a bridge between behaviours that pupils would like to create and the code that can make these happen.
- #5: To create a program and make sense of it you need both knowledge of the domain of the program and knowledge of the programming concepts and language. If both are unfamiliar then the strain it puts on pupils working memory interferes with the learning process. However if you completely de-contextualise you end up with activities that don’t inspire and motivate students. Are there any mathematicians in the audience? No? ….unfortunately a bit like some Maths lessons I’ve had in the past. Pupils also can’t, and probably don’t want to, share what they’ve done with their family and other friends and that’s a missed opportunity to increase their level of persistence.
- #6: Learning to program should be a creative experience that you can share with others however lots of pupils want to immediately build the next call of duty or sims. They become disappointed and demotivated when they realise they don’t have the skills or the time to do that just as they’re starting out. Ideally we’d like motivating contexts they understand and are excited by that allow them to gradually build up their programming knowledge and skills. Also in a classroom environment I feel it’s really important to try to have a shared experience to help to bring pupils together who might not have worked with each other in the past.
- #11: Language and thought are strongly linked. It’s really difficult to think and reason about a particular area if you don’t have the language to do so. Brian Dorn did some research looking at graphic designers who also write code as part of their job and the really struggled to find the kinds of help they really needed because they didn’t have the language and the concepts that would help them.
- #12: A description of the behaviours and features of the program you would like to create.
- #14: Describing key features of different levels of performance Developing pupils ability to critically assess the work they produce Encouraging them to focus on the feedback not a grade