skip to main content
10.1145/2787622.2787735acmconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesicerConference Proceedingsconference-collections
abstract

Investigating Novice Programmers' Plan Composition Strategies

Published: 09 August 2015 Publication History

Abstract

Problem solving through effective plan decomposition and composition continues to be exceedingly difficult for novice programmers. This is exacerbated by the fact that these strategies are usually implicit in instruction: students are left to figure out their own problem solving strategies. My research investigates ways to elicit and improve students' plan decomposition and composition strategies.

References

[1]
M. de Raadt, M. Toleman, and R. Watson. Training Strategic Problem Solvers. SIGCSE Bull., 36(2):48--51, June 2004.
[2]
M. Felleisen, R. B. Findler, M. Flatt, and S. Krishnamurthi. How to Design Programs: An Introduction to Programming and Computing. The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass, Feb. 2001.
[3]
K. Fisler. The Recurring Rainfall Problem. In Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Conference on International Computing Education Research, ICER '14, pages 35--42, New York, NY, USA, 2014. ACM.
[4]
A. Keen and K. Mammen. Program Decomposition and Complexity in CS1. In Proceedings of the 46th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education, SIGCSE '15, pages 48--53, New York, NY, USA, 2015. ACM.
[5]
J. Mead, S. Gray, J. Hamer, R. James, J. Sorva, C. S. Clair, and L. Thomas. A Cognitive Approach to Identifying Measurable Milestones for Programming Skill Acquisition. In Working Group Reports on ITiCSE on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education, ITiCSE-WGR '06, pages 182--194, New York, NY, USA, 2006. ACM.
[6]
O. Muller, D. Ginat, and B. Haberman. Pattern-oriented Instruction and Its Influence on Problem Decomposition and Solution Construction. In Proceedings of the 12th Annual SIGCSE Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education, ITiCSE '07, pages 151--155, New York, NY, USA, 2007. ACM.
[7]
P. L. Pirolli, J. R. Anderson, and R. G. Farrell. Learning to program recursion. In Proceedings of the Sixth Annual Cognitive Science Meetings, pages 277--280, 1984.
[8]
E. Soloway. Learning to Program = Learning to Construct Mechanisms and Explanations. Commun. ACM, 29(9):850--858, Sept. 1986.
[9]
J. C. Spohrer and E. Soloway. Novice Mistakes: Are the Folk Wisdoms Correct? Communications of the ACM, 29(7):624--632, July 1986.
[10]
J. C. Spohrer and E. Soloway. Simulating Student Programmers. In Proceedings of the 11th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence - Volume 1, IJCAI'89, pages 543--549, San Francisco, CA, USA, 1989. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc.

Cited By

View all
  • (2025)Teaching Program Decomposition in CS1: A Conceptual Framework for Improved Code QualityProceedings of the 56th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3641554.3701880(443-449)Online publication date: 12-Feb-2025
  • (2017)Effects of visualizing roles of variables with animation and IDE in novice program constructionTelematics and Informatics10.1016/j.tele.2017.02.00534:5(743-754)Online publication date: 1-Aug-2017

Recommendations

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Conferences
ICER '15: Proceedings of the eleventh annual International Conference on International Computing Education Research
July 2015
300 pages
ISBN:9781450336307
DOI:10.1145/2787622
Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

Sponsors

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 09 August 2015

Check for updates

Author Tags

  1. novice programmers
  2. plan composition
  3. problem solving

Qualifiers

  • Abstract

Funding Sources

  • NSF

Conference

ICER '15
Sponsor:

Acceptance Rates

ICER '15 Paper Acceptance Rate 25 of 96 submissions, 26%;
Overall Acceptance Rate 189 of 803 submissions, 24%

Upcoming Conference

ICER 2025
ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research
August 3 - 6, 2025
Charlottesville , VA , USA

Contributors

Other Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

  • Downloads (Last 12 months)8
  • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)1
Reflects downloads up to 18 Feb 2025

Other Metrics

Citations

Cited By

View all
  • (2025)Teaching Program Decomposition in CS1: A Conceptual Framework for Improved Code QualityProceedings of the 56th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3641554.3701880(443-449)Online publication date: 12-Feb-2025
  • (2017)Effects of visualizing roles of variables with animation and IDE in novice program constructionTelematics and Informatics10.1016/j.tele.2017.02.00534:5(743-754)Online publication date: 1-Aug-2017

View Options

Login options

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

PDF

eReader

View online with eReader.

eReader

Figures

Tables

Media

Share

Share

Share this Publication link

Share on social media