On the achievements of high school students studying computational models

ABSTRACT

One of the units in the relatively new high school CS curriculum which is being implemented in Israel is a theoretical unit on computational models. It includes deterministic and non-deterministic finite automata, regular and non-regular languages, closure properties of regular languages, pushdown automata, closure properties of context free languages, Turing machines, the Church-Turing thesis and the halting problem. This paper focuses on part of a study we conducted dealing with the achievements of high school students studying this unit. Specifically, this paper compares the achievements of students on the technical parts of this unit vs. its theoretical parts. We also examine the correlation between achievements of students studying the Computational Models unit, and two other factors: The students' previous computer-related background (not necessarily computer science) and the level on which they studied mathematics.

References

1. Armoni, M. and Gal-Ezer, J., Non-Determinism in CS High-School Curricula, FIE2003, http://fie.engrng.pitt.edu/fie2003/papers/1251.pdf.
2. Armoni, M., Gal-Ezer, J. and Tirosh D., Solving Problems Reductively. Submitted.
3. Atchison, W. F. et al., Curriculum '68, Recommendations for Academic Programs in Computer Science, Comm. of the ACM, Vol. 11, No. 3, 1968, pp. 151--197.
4. Byrne, P. and Lyons, G., The Effect of Student Attributes on Success in Programming, ITiCSE 01, SIGCSE Bulletin, Vol. 33, No. 3, 2001, pp. 49--52.
5. Denning, P. J. et al., Computing as a Discipline, Comm. of the ACM, Vol. 32, No. 1, 1989, pp. 9--23.
6. Evans, G. E. and Simkin, M. G., What Best Predicts Computer Proficiency?, Comm. of the ACM, Vol. 32, No. 11, 1989, pp. 1322--1327.
7. Gal-Ezer, J., Beeri, C., Harel, D. and Yehudai, A. A High School Program in Computer Science, Computer, Vol. 28, No. 10, 1995, pp. 73--80.
8. Gal-Ezer, J. and Harel, D., Curriculum and Course Syllabi for a High-School Program in Computer Science, Computer Science Education Vol. 9, No. 2, 1999, pp. 114--147.
9. Gal-Ezer, J. and Zur, E., The Concept of 'Algorithm Efficiency' in the High School CS curriculum, FIE 2002, http://fie.engrng.pitt.edu/ fie2002/index.htm, 2001.
10. Hagen, D. and Markham, S., Does It Help to Have Some Programming Experience Before Beginning a Computing Degree Program?, ITiCSE 2000, SIGCSE Bulletin, Vol. 32, No. 3, 2000, pp. 25--28.
11. Merritt, S. M. et al., ACM Model High School Computer Science Curriculum, The Report of the Task Force of the Pre-College Committee of the Education Board of the ACM, 1994, pp. 1--25.
12. Morrison, M. and Newman, T. S., A Study of the Impact of Student Background and Preparedness on Outcomes in CS I, Proceedings of the 32nd SIGSCE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education, SIGSCE Bulletin, Vol. 33, No. 1, 2001, pp. 179--183.
13. Taylor, H. G. and Mounfield, L. C., An Analysis of Success Factors in College Computer Science: High School Methodology is a Key Element, Journal of Research on Computing in Education, Vol. 24, No. 2, 1991, pp. 240--245.
14. Tucker, A. B. et al, Computing curricula 1991, A summary of the ACM/IEEE Joint Curriculum Task Force Report, Comm. of the ACM, Vol. 34, No. 6, 1991, pp. 69--84.
15. Computational Models, A Textbook and a Teacher's Guide, The Open University, Israel, 1998 (In Hebrew).
16. IEEE Computer Society/ACM Task Force, Year 2001 Model Curricula for Computing (CC-2001), http://www.computer.org/ education/cc2001/report/, 2002.

Index Terms

• Social and professional topics

  • Professional topics

    • Computing education

      • Computing education programs

        • Computer science education

• Theory of computation

  • Formal languages and automata theory

  • Models of computation

    • Computability

      • Turing machines