Leo F. Denton

Houston, we have a problem: there's a leak in the CS1 affective oxygen tank

The affective domain can be used to support the internalization of cognitive content and foster the development of curriculum and industry-related interests, attitudes, values, and practices. This study investigated correlations between affective factors and course grade. Interest, perceived competence, effort, lack of pressure, and value correlated significantly with CS1 course grades. Moreover, this study investigated the levels of these factors over the course of CS1. Almost all of the levels of these significant factors decreased significantly during the CS1 course as measured by pretests and posttests. Results of this study further indicated that the use of specific affective objectives and instructional strategies lessened these decreases.

Affective assessment of team skills in agile CS1 labs: the good, the bad, and the ugly

Team experiences can be important learning experiences, and industry highly values team skills in graduates. Low retention rates might also be improved with early team experiences because team experiences have been linked to increases in the sense of belonging, a key retention factor. Team experiences in upper-level courses could also benefit from earlier team experiences. The purpose of this paper is to describe and evaluate an early use of teams in the second semester of our CS1 sequence. The instructional methodology drew heavily upon the professional practices of an agile software development model, Extreme Programming. These professional practices fostered the development of team skills during a semester-long project in a closed lab. The evaluation of our experience revealed aspects of the good, the bad, and the ugly. Areas for improvement and future work are also explained.

Affective factors and student achievement: a quantitative and qualitative study

The affective domain can be used to support the internalization of cognitive content and foster the development of curriculum and industry-related interests, attitudes, values, and practices. During a two-year period, using validated instruments, the authors measured student interest, value, effort, perceived competence, lack of pressure, student-peer belonging, and student-faculty belonging. Initial findings included a positive correlation between each affective factor and course grade, a significant decrease in the levels of affective factors over the course term, and a lessening of those decreases with the use of specific affective objectives and instructional strategies. The current study built upon these initial results by incorporating new quantitative and qualitative data for each affective factor. The paper reports on the results of these analyses and offers practical suggestions and instructional guidelines based upon the findings. These findings appear to be broadly applicable throughout our curriculum and could extend to other science, mathematics, engineering, and technology disciplines.

Agile CS1 Labs: eXtreme Programming Practices in an Introductory Programming Course

Many students begin to form their software development habits in introductory programming courses. Although problem-solving strategies and other good practices are taught at the introductory level, early experiences in programming tend to involve small assignments and so students do not always see the benefits and value of good software engineering practices. Consequently, they develop habits which are hard to break later when faced with significant problems where good practices are essential for success. Furthermore, students report that typical CS1 lab experiences tend to be unsatisfactory and even irrelevant. In order to give the students early meaningful experiences in developing good habits using a software engineering methodology which fits the limited time-constraints of the academic environment, eXtreme Programming (XP) was employed for the lab portion of a second semester CS1 course. This paper describes how XP practices were incorporated into a semester-long project where classes met once a week in a closed lab. Specific affective objectives were also introduced which were measured quantitatively and qualitatively. This paper describes our methodology, assessment, results, and plans for improvement.

Affective objectives in a programming languages course

This paper discusses the use of affective objectives in upper-level computer science courses. The use of affective objectives can enrich student experiences, support student motivation, and enhance the achievement of the cognitive objectives. The paper documents an effort to incorporate affective objectives into a junior level programming languages course. Two affective objectives for that course are identified and two exercises used to achieve those objectives are presented. Observations from the use of these exercises led the authors to conclude that they were beneficial.