Diane Horton

Repairing conversational misunderstandings and non-understandings

Abstract Participants in a discourse sometimes fail to understand one another, but, when aware of the problem, collaborate upon or negotiate the meaning of a problematic utterance. To address non-understanding, we have developed two plan-based models of collaboration in identifying the correct referent of a description: one covers situations where both conversants know of the referent, and the other covers situations, such as direction-giving, where the recipient does not. In the models, conversants use the mechanisms of refashioning, suggestion and elaboration, to collaboratively refine a referring expression until it is successful. To address misunderstanding, we have developed a model that combines intentional and social accounts of discourse to support the negotiation of meaning. The approach extends intentional accounts by using expectations deriving from social conventions in order to guide interpretation. Reflecting the inherent symmetry of the negotiation of meaning, all our models can act as both speaker and hearer, and can play both the role of the conversant who is not understood or misunderstood and the role of the conversant who fails to understand.

Gr8 designs for Gr8 girls: a middle-school program and its evaluation

In order to address the under-representation of women in Computer Science, we have created a program for middle-school girls that specifically aims to change their attitudes about CS and encourages them to see it as a potential career. Our assessment of the program shows that it did indeed have a significant, positive impact and suggests that this was still in effect three months later. This paper describes the program and its assessment, and makes suggestions for those considering offering a similar program.

Evaluating an inverted CS1

This case study explores an inverted classroom offering of an introductory programming course (CS1). Students prepared for lecture by watching short lecture videos and completing required in-video quiz questions. During lecture, the students worked through exercises with the support of the instructor and teaching assistants. We describe the course implementation and its assessment, including pre- and post-course surveys. We also discuss lessons learned, modifications that we plan to make for the next offering, and recommendations for others teaching inverted courses.

Comparing outcomes in inverted and traditional CS1

We compare a traditional CS1 offering with an inverted offering delivered the following year to a comparable student population. We measure student attitudes, grades, and final course outcomes and find that, while students in the inverted offering do not report increased enjoyment and are no more likely to pass, learning as measured by final exam performance increases significantly. This increase is not simply a function of a more onerous inverted offering, as students report spending similar time per week in the traditional and inverted offerings. Contrary to our hypotheses, however, we find no evidence that the the inverted offering disproportionally helps beginners or those not fully fluent in English.

Drop, Fail, Pass, Continue: Persistence in CS1 and Beyond in Traditional and Inverted Delivery

Much attention has been paid to the failure rate in CS1 and attrition between CS1 and CS2. In our study of 1236 CS1 students, we examine subgroups of students, to find out how characteristics such as prior experience and reason for taking the course influence who drops, fails, or passes, and who continues on to CS2. We also examine whether student characteristics influence outcomes differently in traditional vs. inverted offerings of the course. We find that more students in the inverted offering failed the midterm test, but those who failed were much more likely to either drop the course or recover and ultimately pass the course. While we find no difference between the offerings in the overall drop-fail-pass rates or in the percentage and types of students who go on to take CS2, there is a significant, widely felt, boost in exam grades in the inverted offering.

Forming reasonably optimal groups: (FROG)

Instructors often put students into groups for coursework. Several tools exist to facilitate this process, but they typically limit the criteria one can use for forming groups. We have defined a general mathematical model for group formation: a set of attribute types, group-formation criteria, and fitness measures. We have implemented an optimizer that uses an evolutionary algorithm to create groups according to the instructors criteria. Our experiments support the hypothesis that, even with a general model, reasonably optimal solutions to the group-formation problem can be found in reasonable time. Several instructors have used the tool to form groups for their courses. In all cases, they were impressed by the expressiveness of the model and pleased with the quality of the groups produced.

Presuppositions as beliefs

Most theories of presupposition implicitly assume that presuppositions are facts, and that all agents involved in a discourse share belief in the presuppositions that it generates. These unrealistic assumptions can be eliminated if each presupposition is treated as the belief of an agent. However, it is not enough to consider only the beliefs of the speaker; we show that the beliefs of other agents are often involved. We describe a new model, including an improved definition of presupposition, that treats presuppositions as beliefs and considers the beliefs of all agents involved in the discourse. We show that treating presuppositions as beliefs makes it possible to explain phenomena that cannot be explained otherwise.

Introducing and Evaluating Exam Wrappers in CS2

In addition to their role as a summative measure, midterm tests can provide formative feedback that can be used by students to identify areas of weakness and adjust studying approaches. Unfortunately, low levels of test pickup often preclude this type of learning from tests. Even when students do collect their marked tests, it is unclear how much they reflect on or learn from the feedback. Exam wrappers have been designed and used in other sciences to promote reflection on tests and improve study practices. In this paper, we introduce exam wrappers into a CS course. We outline our adoption of exam wrappers, and illustrate how we as educators can learn from student responses on exam wrappers. We also describe an experiment comparing three styles of exam wrapper. Although it did not find significant differential impact on exam scores, we find, for all wrapper styles, improved test pickup rates and qualitative evidence that students successfully reflect on past behaviour and recognize improved study strategies.

Online CS1: Who Enrols, Why, and How Do They Do?

When students can choose to take a course online or face-to-face, who chooses each format? Why do students select one format instead of the other? We compare an online section of CS1 to a concurrent face-to-face section and find that the populations in the two sections are very different. In particular, students in the online section have less prior programming experience and are less likely to intend to major in computer science. We also examine the reasons why students choose their section, many of which relate to convenience, desire for interaction with others, and degree of familiarity with the course material. Finally, we compare course outcomes for the two sections. We find significant differences in drop rates, but not in final exam scores. We investigate whether the differences we find can be explained by differences in the populations who choose to take the course online vs face-to-face.

Impact of reward structures in an inverted course

The inverted or flipped classroom has been shown to be effective in computer science. Inverted teaching depends on students engaging in both pre- and in-lecture activities. What reward structure will motivate students to do so? We report on our experience with inverted teaching for a one-month unit in a third-year database course.