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This small scale study aims to analyze the question papers of Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education in the subject of computer science with reference to item analysis and Bloom's taxonomy. Data were collected from 100 students of Grade 9th and 10th from the schools of Lahore city using convenient sampling technique. Data collected on the papers developed by Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education for the year of 2015 and 2016. Item analyses were performed using Conquest software. Findings of the study shows that in the question papers conducted by Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education the majority questions were measuring the student abilities of knowledge and comprehension and only few questions were given to measure the student abilities to analyze, synthesize and evaluate, and this can be very helpful for the policy makers. Result of item analysis shows that many questions were not in the acceptable range of item difficulty and item discrimination. Items in the question papers were either too easy or too difficult. Findings revealed that the papers conducted and administered by Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education were not up to the mark, with reference to Bloom's taxonomy. The researcher recommended to train the assessment committee/panel developing the items. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contributions: The underrepresentation of women in computer science (CS) majors has long been a focus of attention in many academic documents, the majority of them from the United States and Europe. There is, however, a lack of information about educational interventions (EIs) for women in computing in Latin America. The contribution of this article is to cover this gap and describe what researchers in Latin American countries have been publishing about the recruitment and retention of women in the CS field. Background: Many EIs targeting female students at different educational levels--K-12, undergraduate, and graduate--have been undertaken to increase the participation of women in computing in Latin America. However, descriptions of these activities rarely are included in international academic databases. Research Questions: This literature mapping addresses two main research questions (RQ) about the topic of women in computing in academic publications in Latin American countries: RQ1) what are the characteristics of the publications about women in computing in Latin America? and RQ2) what are the published interventions to recruit and retain women in computing in Latin America? To answer RQ1, six subquestions were created covering year, language, country of origin, document type, and professional track. Furthermore, for RQ2, two subquestions were created involving educational level and the use of software development with a female theme. Methodology: This investigation used the systematic literature mapping process. To achieve a broad coverage of papers, the following sources were included: Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, EBSCO, the proceedings of the Latin American Women in Computing Conference (LAWCC), and those of the Women in Technology (WIT) workshop colocated with the annual conference of the Brazilian Computer Society (SBC). The included papers were published in the last decade (2010-2020) and written in English, Portuguese, or Spanish. Findings: The literature mapping encompasses 197 academic documents, 48.2% of which were written in Portuguese, 28.7% in English, and 23.1% in Spanish. The papers originated from 15 of the 20 Latin American countries. Brazil and Costa Rica have the highest number of publications overall. The documents describe initiatives to increase the participation of women in computing majors that cover the entire educational spectrum, from K-12 to graduate programs, but papers targeting populations in higher education have started to appear recently.

Despite being in a digital age, the diversity of young people choosing to study and work in computing is of ongoing concern, especially low numbers of girls. This paper aims to determine the profile of students who are more likely to aspire to be computer scientists and provide insights into the key factors that shape their aspirations in this area. We draw on questionnaire data from 4,983 secondary school students in England, in schools that have a higher-than-average uptake of GCSE Computer Science (a national exam taken by students at age 16). Amongst students who have chosen to study GCSE Computer Science, girls have a lower odds of aspiring to be a Computer Scientist compared to boys. Amongst younger students yet to pick their GCSE options, there are significantly more girls than boys wanting to work in digital art. Multivariable regression analysis identified 10 factors that were associated with aspirations to become a computer scientist. These include being a boy, being of Asian ethnicity, currently studying GCSE Computer Science, having a parent in computing, as well as having higher 'coding self-belief', elevated levels of 'family support' and aspiring towards 'technical jobs'. Implications for practice and curriculum design are discussed.

In a course of the degree of computer science, the programming project has changed from individual to teamed work, tentatively in couples (pair programming). Students have full freedom to team up with minimum intervention from teachers. The analysis of the working groups made indicates that students do not tend to associate with students with a similar academic performance, perhaps because general cognitive parameters do not drive the choice of academic partners. Pair programming seems to give great results, so the efforts of future research in this field should focus precisely on how these pairs are formed, underpinning the mechanisms of human social interactions. [Paper presented at the International Conference on University Teaching and Innovation (CIDUI): Learning and Teaching Innovation Impacts (9th, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain, Jul 5-7 2016.)]

The teaching-learning methodology adopted in the Introduction to Computer Science classes may be a process that makes it difficult to understand the principles of programming language for undergraduate students in Computer Science and related areas, generating high failure and course drop out rates. This paper presents an analysis of the results obtained in the Introduction to Computer Science classes taught in Computer Science and Engineering courses at University of Brasília (UnB). The evaluation questionnaire answered by the undergraduate students in 2017 was analyzed, a validation was performed, and we checked the level of students satisfaction in relation to the evaluated subject and the association among the level of satisfaction, the percentage of practical activities of the discipline, student performance and the level of absenteeism.

Recently, computational thinking (CT) has attracted much research attention, especially within primary and secondary education settings. However, incorporating in mathematics or other disciplines is not a straightforward process and introduces many challenges concerning the way disciplines are organised and taught in school. The aim of this paper is to identify what characterises CT in mathematics education and which CT aspects can be addressed within mathematics education. First, we present a systematic literature review that identifies characteristics of CT that have been explored in mathematics education research. Second, we present the results of a Delphi study conducted to capture the collective opinion of 25 mathematics and computer science experts regarding the opportunities for addressing CT in mathematics education. The results of the Delphi study, which corroborate the findings of the literature review, highlight three important aspects of CT to be addressed in mathematics education: problem solving, cognitive processes, and transposition.

A new, interdisciplinary, team-taught course has been designed to educate students in Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) so that they can respond to global and urgent issues concerning computer control systems in nuclear power plants. This paper discusses our experience and assessment of the interdisciplinary computer and nuclear energy course, which was developed and offered primarily to ECE students at Howard University. A unique team-teaching model utilized with ECE professors and nuclear field experts was applied to teach the two diverse subjects: computer safety and nuclear energy. The survey result from the first offering of the course showed a very positive response from the majority of the students about the team-teaching method and the knowledge acquired on the two subjects.

In Italy, teaching coding at primary and secondary levels is emerging as a major educational issue, particularly in light of the recent reforms now being implemented. Consequently, there has been increased research on how to introduce information technology in lower secondary schools. This paper presents an exploratory survey, carried out through an intensive workshop on coding, which was designed to introduce the basic principles of computer science to be included in the future school curriculum. Specifically, the paper examines three key aspects of the coding unit for lower secondary schools: (a) the students' perception of their self-efficacy in carrying out coding; (b) the involvement of students' cognition and perception; (c) the principal obstacles students might encounter while coding. The results are encouraging as they demonstrate that coding turns out to be both highly interesting and motivating for students.

In this paper we have examined the position and roles of Computer Science in curricula in the light of recent calls for curriculum change and we have proposed principles and issues to consider in curriculum design as well as identifying priority areas for further research. The paper is based on discussions within and beyond the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP) Education Community since 2012 as well as an analysis of curriculum developments in five different countries. Emerging themes have been discussed with reference to important perspectives from curriculum theory including "powerful knowledge" as a key element of entitlement and management of the growth of expertise. Based on this analysis we have identified areas of consensus as well as constraints, risks and issues that are still subject to controversy. There is an emerging consensus of the importance of Computer Science and the nature of its "powerful knowledge". Furthermore current understanding of the opportunities and benefits for starting to learn Computer Science early in primary schools has identified this early start as an entitlement and equity issue. There is a strong consensus that teacher professional development in Computer Science Education is critical for supporting curriculum change and is currently a major challenge in many countries. Other key issues include understanding how the growth of expertise affects potential structure and sequencing in the curriculum and the balance of content. Further considerations include how new technological opportunities interact with pedagogical approaches and can provide new potential for the growth of expertise.

Computer science has been a discipline for some years, and its position in the school curriculum has been contested differently in several countries. This paper looks at its role in three countries to illustrate these differences. A reconsideration of computer science as a separate subject both in primary and secondary education is suggested. At EDUsummIT 2015 it was argued that the major rationales for including computer science as a subject in the K-12 curriculum are economic, social and cultural. The paper explores these three rationales and also a beneficence matrix to assist curriculum designers. It also argues computer science is rapidly becoming critical for generating new knowledge, and should be taught as a distinct subject or content area, especially in secondary schools. The paper concludes by looking at some of the key questions to be considered when implementing computer science in the school curriculum, and at ways its role might change in the future.

Controversy and fanfare accompanied the announcement in 2010 by Mattel, Inc. of the Barbie® doll's 126th career--computer engineer. Even though women have been and still are in a minority in the information technology (IT) and computer science (CS) fields, enough women voted for the computer engineer as the next career for Barbie® on Mattel's website that it won the overall vote, while the winning choice voted for by young girls was news anchorwoman. The discrepancy resulted in Mattel producing Barbie® dolls in both careers. This paper reports the results of a survey completed by women in the IT and CS fields regarding their attitudes about and purchases of Computer Engineer Barbie®.

This paper reports on progress and conclusions of two-year research of gender issues in studying computer science at Department of Mathematics and Informatics, Faculty of Science, University of Novi Sad. Using statistics on data gathered by a survey, the work presented here focused on identifying, understanding, and correlating both female and male students' performance, professional motivation, ambition, confidence level and attitudes towards differences, learning quality and nature of the field. Results show agreement with theoretical predictions and significant improvement over previous efforts; providing profound implications for future studies of gender-sensitive IT education in the region and beyond. (Contains 11 tables.)

In this paper we present a software platform called Chatbot designed to introduce high school students to Computer Science (CS) concepts in an innovative way: by programming chatbots. A chatbot is a bot that can be programmed to have a conversation with a human or robotic partner in some natural language such as English or Spanish. While programming their chatbots, students use fundamental CS constructs such as variables, conditionals, and finite state automata, among others. Chatbot uses pattern matching, state of the art lemmatization techniques, and finite state automata in order to provide automatic formative assessment to the students. When an error is found, the formative feedback generated is immediate and task-level. We evaluated Chatbot in two observational studies. An online nation-wide competition where more than 10,000 students participated. And, a mandatory in-class 15-lesson pilot course in three high schools. We measured indicators of student engagement (task completion, participation, self reported interest, etc.) and found that girls' engagement with Chatbot was higher than boys' for most indicators. Also, in the online competition, the task completion rate for the students that decided to use Chatbot was five times higher than for the students that chose to use the renowned animation and game programming tool Alice. Our results suggest that the availability of automatic formative assessment may have an impact on task completion and other engagement indicators among high school students.

The development of collaborative Web applications does not follow a software engineering methodology. This is because when university students study Web applications in general, and collaborative Web portals in particular, they are not being trained in the use of software engineering techniques to develop collaborative Web portals. This paper presents a strategy for teaching collaborative Web portals based on reverse engineering and reuse mechanisms to engineer the collaborative Web portals' development. This strategy was successfully used in a final-year course of a Computer Science program at Carlos III University of Madrid, Spain. Its use has demonstrated an improvement in the maintainability of the Web projects developed as well as a decrease in the number of failures during the test phase. This is a very important step toward the engineering of Web applications. The students' grades for the same subject, with the same content and lecturers, also improved compared to those from previous years. The strategy, the details of its use, the results obtained after analyzing the projects the students developed, and their final grades are described in this paper. (Contains 15 figures and 11 tables.)

Reversing is the notion of thinking or working in reverse. Computer science textbooks and tutors recognize it primarily in the form of recursion. However, recursion is only one form of reversing. Reversing appears in the computer science curriculum in many other forms, at various intellectual levels, in a variety of fundamental courses. As such, it is too important a notion to be left unexplored. In this paper we discuss reversing in the context of two theoretical frameworks--as a fundamental idea in computer science, in the context of Schwill's model of fundamental ideas, and as a powerful problem solving means, in the context of Schoenfeld's cognitive model of problem solving. We recognize seven different forms of reversing, and demonstrate the essential role of each in algorithm or proof design. Our focus in the paper is conceptual, yet we briefly note our initial experimental experience, with student difficulties in both the invocation and utilization of reversing. We then discuss cognitive aspects of the teaching of reversing and offer ways to assimilate its awareness and elaborate its fundamental role in computer science. (Contains 1 note.)

This paper discusses the role of reduction in computer science and describes a study on undergraduate students' perception of the concept of reduction. Specifically, based on an analysis of students answers to questions addressing different computer science topics, we present several findings regarding the ways in which undergraduate students conceive of and apply reduction. These findings can be interpreted within the framework of the tension that exists between the following two factors: The need to think in terms of high levels of abstraction, on one hand, and the fact that reduction introduces a new approach to be used in problem-solving situations, on the other. In addition the paper suggests several teaching applications.

This paper illustrates an approach used to enhance student learning outcomes in a combined cross-listed Systems Analysis and Design (SA&D) course and examines benefits perceived by students through analysis of assessment and students feedback. The SA&D course is a required course in both the Management Information Systems (MIS) major and the Applied Computer Science (ACS) major. The SA&D course was taught to a combined cross-listed class of MIS and ACS students over a period of two years. Two strategies were adopted to make the course a worthwhile learning experience for students in both majors. The first was to extend the scope of the course within the System Development Life Cycle spectrum to include planning before analysis and implementation (prototype) after the design. The second strategy was to have a running group project as the main assessment (accounting for 50% of the course grade) where each group had at least one student from each of the two majors. These groups carried out a system development project with four phased deliverables: system proposal, requirements specifications, design specifications and a working prototype with emphasis on user interfaces. This paper provides a comprehensive overview of how the combined cross-listed course was designed, delivered and refined for future offerings. It also examines the value of teamwork using students' feedback. The students' experiences were studied over a two-year period. Two different instruments were used to gather feedback and to analyze the effectiveness of the combined cross-listed strategy: a qualitative study and a quantitative study concerning student perception on learning enhancement. Initially a qualitative study with open-ended questions was carried out to identify areas for improvement and to examine how well these strategies had worked. The three problems identified were lack of sufficient time for the last phase (working prototype), lack of time for team meetings, and lack of a comprehensive example case. These problems were addressed in subsequent course offerings. The study also revealed that about 80 percent of the students liked working in a mixed group setting on the extended course project, and 75 percent of the students indicated that working on the mixed group project offered them real-world experience. Encouraged by such positive observations, a quantitative study was conducted on students' perceptions concerning specific learning outcomes for carrying out the various system development tasks and the development of skills (including soft skills) among and between the two majors. The results indicated that the students from both majors perceived more than average learning outcomes and skills development. It also indicated that while the ACS students claimed to have learned relatively more on feasibility analysis and information gathering, the MIS students claimed to have learned relatively more on user interface design and architectural design. However, the results indicated that the perceived differences in the learning outcomes between the two majors were not significant. The analysis confirms an enhanced learning outcome for both the ACS and the MIS majors due to knowledge sharing made available through teamwork. (Contains 4 tables and 1 figure.)

Data Structures and Algorithms are a central part of Computer Science. Due to their abstract and dynamic nature, they are a difficult topic to learn for many students. To alleviate these learning difficulties, instructors have turned to algorithm visualizations (AV) and AV systems. Research has shown that especially engaging AVs can have an impact on student learning of DSA topics. Until recently, most AV systems were Java-based systems. But, the popularity of Java has declined and is being supplanted by HTML5 and JavaScript content online. In this paper, we present JSAV: the JavaScript AV development library. JSAV goes beyond traditional AV library support for displaying standard data structures components, to provide functionality to simplify creation of AVs on many engagement levels including interactive exercises. We describe the growing body of content created with JSAV and summarize our three years of experience and research results from using JSAV to build content that supports CS education.

This paper presents a qualitative study of 12 computer science lecturers' experiences of curriculum design of several degree programmes during a time of transition from year-long to semesterised courses, due to institutional policy change. The background to the study is outlined, as are the reasons for choosing the research methodology. The main findings are presented and the implications of the study described. The methodology chosen was hermeneutic phenomenology. The data were the texts of interview transcripts of the 12 participant lecturers. The experiences that emerged from analysis of the data grouped naturally in identifiable and presentable themes and these themes represent the findings of the study. The findings of our study describe the computer science lecturers' lived experiences as curriculum designers, most especially in relation to institutional policy, and a new modularisation/semesterisation approach to curriculum design. Findings include the feeling lecturers have that much of the formality of curriculum design is bureaucratic, and that academics and staff do not communicate very much in relation to policy. Also, modularisation and semesterisation causes difficulty for lecturers in their designing of curricula. The findings also suggest that lecturers feel obliged to do the best they can for students. The findings lead to points of discussion that are relevant to groups and individuals associated with third-level education.

Graduate employability has become an issue since there are broad mismatches between the acquired graduate skills from university and the required skills by employers. While previous researches have outlined the salient skills that need to be embedded in graduate education, to date no studies have attempted to methodically identify and synthesize the literature on graduate attributes. In this paper a total of 39 relevant studies on graduate skills and attributes in the subject areas of business and management, accounting, and computer science were extracted from Scopus® (database). This revealed a total of 53 graduate attributes, with some being highly used, such as communication, teamwork, problem solving, technological skills, creativity, interpersonal skills, leadership skills, self-management and flexibility/adaptability. The majority of studies used a quantitative survey method to collect and rank graduate attributes, and Australia emerged as the most active country in researching the domain.

Stepwise program refinement techniques can be used to simplify program verification. Programs are better understood since their main properties are clearly stated, and verification of rather complex algorithms is reduced to proving simple statements connecting successive program specifications. Additionally, it is easy to analyse similar algorithms and to compare their properties within a single formalization. Usually, formal analysis is not done in the educational setting due to complexity of verification and a lack of tools and procedures to make comparison easy. Verification of an algorithm should not only give a correctness proof, but also better understanding of an algorithm. If the verification is based on a small step program refinement, it can become simple enough to be demonstrated within the university-level computer science curriculum. In this paper we demonstrate this and give a formal analysis of two well- known algorithms (Selection Sort and Heap Sort) using the proof assistant Isabelle/HOL and program refinement techniques.

The undergraduate computer science curriculum is generally focused on skills and tools; most students are not exposed to much research in the field, and do not learn how to navigate the research literature. We describe how fiction reviews (and specifically science fiction) are used as a gateway to research reviews. Students learn a little about current or recent research on a topic that stirs their imagination, and learn how to search for, read critically, and compare technical papers on a topic related to their chosen science fiction book, movie, or TV show.

This paper presents the main findings, and lessons learned, from introducing a synchronous peer collaboration activity in a distance learning computer science course. Synergo, a software that supports such an approach, was used in this activity. The organizational, technical, and academic challenges of introducing this activity in the course are discussed. After analyzing the students' interaction and their opinions, and evaluating the final results, it was found that this activity was received positively by the group of students concerned, who engaged in peer tutoring and used this as an opportunity to break the isolation of the distance learning setting and to forge links with each other. (Contains 1 table, 3 figures, and 1 footnote.)

This paper focuses on challenges in mentoring software development projects in the high school and analyzes difficulties encountered by Computer Science teachers in the mentoring process according to Shulman's Teacher Knowledge Base Model. The main difficulties that emerged from the data analysis belong to the following knowledge sources of Shulman's model: Content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) and knowledge of learners and their characteristics. We suggest that the complexity of the mentoring process of software project development in the high school results mainly from the fact that the process involves a variety of knowledge types, as well as management activities and pedagogical aspects. This fact leads us to conclude that a mentoring methodology should be defined for this complex task, similar to software project development methodologies applied in the industry. We summarize with a discussion of the nature of such a methodology. (Contains 2 tables and 1 note.)

Computer science education should not be based on short-term developments but on content that is observable in multiple domains of computer science, may be taught at every intellectual level, will be relevant in the longer term, and is related to everyday language and/or thinking. Recently, a catalogue of "central concepts" for computer science education such as "algorithm", "computer", and "data" has been empirically determined. This paper now concentrates on "central processes" relevant for computer science education. Experts of computer science rated 44 general-education processes regarding four criteria. By using a cluster analysis approach the following central processes for computer science education have been identified: "problem solving and problem posing", "analyzing", "generalizing", "finding relationships", "classifying", and "investigating". (Contains 1 table, 6 figures, and 2 notes.)

Abstraction is a major concept in computer science and serves as a powerful tool in software development. Pattern-oriented instruction (POI) is a pedagogical approach that incorporates patterns in an introductory computer science course in order to structure the learning of algorithmic problem solving. This paper examines abstraction processes in the course of solving an algorithmic problem and highlights three distinct, although interrelated, facets of abstraction: pattern recognition, black-boxing, and structure identification. A study that examined the influence of the POI approach on students' abstraction skills is described; students who learned according to the POI approach were compared with students who learned in a traditional manner with regard to analogical reasoning and problem decomposition and solution, as well as verbal expression. The three facets of abstraction were used to analyze students' abstraction skills and their competency in algorithmic problem solving. (Contains 4 figures and 5 tables.)

As teachers search for the most appropriate form of TIDE education for the future, they must consider as many alternatives as possible. One such alternative is computational science, which is described in detail in this interview with Dr. Aaron Clark of North Carolina State University. Dr. Clark recently agreed to this interview, with the primary objective of providing readers another curriculum and instruction perspective for consideration.

Non-determinism is one of the most important, yet abstract, recurring concepts of Computer Science. It plays an important role in Computer Science areas such as formal language theory, computability theory, distributed computing, and operating systems. We conducted a series of studies on the perception of non-determinism. In the current research, we studied and analyzed undergraduate Computer Science students' solutions to assignments in a course on automata and formal languages. Our findings shed some light on students' perceptions of non-determinism, their tendency to use non-determinism, and the characteristics of their non-deterministic solutions. This paper describes the current research and its results, and suggests several teaching applications. (Contains 14 figures and 1 table.)

This paper aims at explaining the outcomes of information technology education for international students using anthropological theories of cultural schemas. Even though computer science and engineering are usually assumed to be culture-independent, the practice in classrooms seems to indicate that learning patterns depend on culture. The situation in a college in Finland is evaluated based on study records, surveys on learning experiences, learning logs by students and classroom observations. Reasons for the educational outcome are discussed theoretically using cultural anthropology and the socio-cultural theory of learning. The universality of Western scientific thinking is questioned, and a need to recognise different cultural schemas in the thinking of international students is acknowledged. The study concludes that a view of human cognition as social and embodied gives new insights to information technology education when there is a great diversity of student backgrounds and their culturally produced mental schemas. (Contains 2 figures and 2 tables.)

Although nearly every college offers a major in computer science, many computer science teachers at the secondary level have received little formal training. This paper presents details of a project that could make a significant contribution to national efforts to improve computer science education by combining teacher education and professional development. A computer science endorsement program will prepare preservice teachers in: basic skills and concepts, programming, algorithm design, computer system components, data bases, and social issues related to computer use. A series of professional development workshops will improve the content knowledge of current teachers, enabling them to teach computer science concepts and information technology fluency.

This paper addresses the influx of computer science graduates from South Asia into Europe and North America. It analyses the need and supply chains between two points and identifies the pros and cons of the education imparted to these graduates. The effects of social disorder due to migrations are addressed. The resulting technological vacuum in the donor countries is also analysed. It concludes with recommendations to reduce the impact on both the donor and receiving countries. (Contains 1 table.)

Instructors teaching beginning programming classes are often interested in exercises that involve processing photographs (i.e., files stored as .jpeg). They may wish to offer activities such as color inversion, the color manipulation effects archived with pixel thresholding, or steganography, all of which Stevenson et al. [4] assert are sought by students. However, instructors may not find textual support for these topics since widely used introductory textbooks do not illustrate the needed techniques, and the professional Java literature obscures these straightforward operations in elaborate discussions. This paper presents the code to make image processing accessible through fragments used to hide a text message in a read-in JPEG file, store the image as a PGN file, and extract the message from the stored image.

Providing adequate computing lab support for Management Information Systems (MIS) and Computer Science (CS) programs is a perennial challenge for most academic institutions in the US and abroad. Factors, such as lack of physical space, budgetary constraints, conflicting needs of different courses, and rapid obsolescence of computing technology, precipitate this challenge. While introductory computing courses can be adequately supported through general labs, advanced computing courses typically require dedicated labs. Normally, however, even a dedicated lab must simultaneously support multiple courses with diverse support requirements. Consequently, in designing dedicated computing labs, versatility and flexibility of the lab must be the prime consideration. Drawing on the insights gained from developing a dedicated lab, the authors present a model for developing a versatile, flexible lab to support computer network courses. The proposed model entails a modular design approach which offers ease of management, configuration and upgrading of the lab by decoupling the lab functions into layers. The layered design divides the lab into four management layers: (1) wiring layer, (2) networking layer, (3) server systems layer, and (4) support procedures layer. Each layer offers a versatile and configurable design and serves as a foundation for the next higher layer. "Wiring layer" minimizes the wire configuration efforts and enhances wiring flexibility by utilizing patch panels at the computer desks and the racks housing networking devices, and sufficient underground wiring between desks and racks. The underground wiring allows for network, telephone and serial cable connections as needed. "Network layer" builds LANs, subnets and internets with minimal configuration effort through a careful arrangement of network hubs, switches, routers, and firewalls. The network layer distinguishes between permanent networks needed in the lab, called pre-configured networks, and the networks that are assembled and disassembled by the students, called configurable networks. The network address allocation schemes for different types of network experiments are also discussed. "Server systems layer" covers two categories of servers: pre-configured servers and configurable servers. Pre-configured servers, such as DNS and file servers, are production servers that support network experiments. Configurable servers are hardware platforms that can be configured as needed according to experimental needs. The last layer, "procedural layer", provides policies, guidelines and operational procedures that are needed for proper utilization of the lab space and the equipment. The paper also illustrates the application of the proposed model through the design and configuration of the computing lab for network courses underlying this case study. (Contains 6 figures and 2 tables.)

This paper describes an empirical study that investigated the knowledge that Computer Science students have about the extent of their own previous learning. The study compared self-generated estimates of performance with actual performance on a data structures quiz taken by undergraduate students in courses requiring data structures as a prerequisite. The study was contextualized and grounded within a research paradigm in Psychology called "calibration of knowledge" that suggests that self-knowledge across a range of disciplines is highly unreliable. Such self-knowledge is important because of its role in "meta-cognition", particularly in cognitive self-regulation and monitoring, as well as in the credence that instructors give to student self-reports. Our results indicated that Computer Science student self-estimates are highly correlated with performance, more so for estimates provided after the performance than before. This high level of calibration, however, was likely the result of a number of conditions that do not always hold: that the students already had domain expertise, that the quiz had unambiguous and verifiable answers, and that students expected their estimates to be validated. When these conditions are not met, it becomes more important for students to have direct feedback about their performance so as to uncover those areas where their intuitions might mislead them. Students also had weak knowledge about their standing relative to their peers, particularly those in the lower performance quartiles, exhibiting the well known "better-than-average" heuristic. There was, additionally, no correlation between calibration ability and degree of liking or difficulty with the data structures material, suggesting that instructors and researchers should not treat liking or difficulty as reliable indicators of the learning that has occurred. (Contains 1 note, 4 tables and 4 figures.)

This paper reports preliminary work in an ARC Linkage Project involving collaboration among James Cook University, Education Queensland, and Technology One (a Queensland based company). The project aims to identify and interpret factors associated with low female participation rates in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) professional level occupations and education pathways. Data is being collected using qualitative and quantitative methods. A survey is being administered to over 6,000 year 11 and 12 female high school students in Queensland to provide a comprehensive database that will be augmented with individual and focus group interviews. An online survey will be administered to women working in ICT industries. Reference groups representing EQ and ICT industries have been established to provide consultative advice and feedback throughout the project, and to function as working groups during the data analysis and interpretation phases. Project results will inform the development of strategic response options for education systems and ICT industries and suggest further research and industry-based initiatives designed to enhance female participation rates. (Contains 2 endnotes.)

This paper proposes an evaluation framework for assessing students' comprehension of concurrent programs. The need for such a framework is illustrated by a review of various Computer Science Education forums. This review suggests that there is little pedagogical research in the area of concurrent software, particularly with respect to assessing students' knowledge. In particular, the proposed framework attempts to categorize the types of information students seek and the types of information they obtain, as they learn about concurrent software. Thus the framework could be used to guide teaching methods in this area, to hone the representations used to portray concurrent software to students and subsequently, to assess students' performance. (Contains 4 tables.)

Teaching is a scholarly activity and a life-long learning process with no single method or pedagogy that is always most effective. Applications of teaching pedagogies properly vary from content-based to discipline-based areas. In this paper, various teaching pedagogies, including scaffolding, concept mapping, constructivism, and learning strategies including problem-based learning, collaborative learning, and active learning, is discussed and their applications in effective teaching of undergraduate Computer Science is demonstrated.

Computer science is becoming increasingly important in our society. Meta skills, such as problem solving and logical and algorithmic thinking, are emphasized in every field, not only in the natural sciences. Still, largely due to gaps in tuition, common misunderstandings exist about the true nature of computer science. These are especially problematic for high school students, who need to have a realistic view of what studying computer science would be like in order to make advised decisions about their future careers. The principal objective of Finnish high schools is to prepare young students for further studies and life in general; it can therefore be seen as something of a paradox that these schools are not obliged to provide their students with tuition in computer science. In this paper we describe the project "DASK" (DAtakunskap i SKolan, Computer Science in Schools), which aims at introducing computer science to Swedish-speaking high school students by providing university level computer science courses on the web. The purpose is to give a realistic view of computer science, at the same time removing any potential misunderstandings about its true nature. The "DASK"-curriculum includes web-based versions of the five basic courses taught at the university with no trade-offs in either contents or difficulty level. The main focus is on student activity, emphasizing the importance of continuous work throughout the courses. We have formulated the "ActiWe" (Active on the Web) principle, a main guideline applied when designing, developing and giving the courses. Instructors at the university are responsible for the courses in most ways (acting as the course lecturer, maintaining the material, checking assignments, giving feedback etc.), but each high school has a contact teacher who supports the students locally. "DASK" was initiated in 2002, and has been popular from the very beginning; feedback from both students and teachers has been positive. In a recently conducted survey (January 2005), many of the teachers stated that their schools would not be able to provide any computer science-related courses on their own, thus indicating a definite need for the "DASK"-courses. In addition, the high number of participants registering for the first course each year implies that there is a genuine interest for computer science among high school students. Our experience shows that the greatest challenges for both students and university instructors are time-related: in most schools, the "DASK"-courses are not given time in the schedule and are thus not part of the actual tuition; this leads to already stressful periods becoming even more burdensome for the students. Giving the "DASK"-courses has also proved to be time-consuming for the university instructors; much time and effort has to be invested in maintaining the material, but particularly in giving individual feedback for assignments to all students on a weekly basis. A future challenge is thus to improve the time management of both students and instructors. (Contains 2 figures and 1 table.)

Teaching future knowledge engineers, the necessary skills for designing and implementing intelligent software solutions required by business, industry and research today, is a very tall order. These skills are not easily taught in traditional undergraduate computer science lectures; nor are the practical experiences easily reinforced in laboratory sessions. In an attempt to address this issue, a software development project, designed to take students through a complete process of knowledge engineering, was introduced in an undergraduate Intelligent Systems subject. In this project, students were required to act as domain experts, knowledge engineers, programmers, end users and project manager in the production of a game-playing expert system. The paper describes the project, its objectives and development, as well as some of the benefits. (Contains 3 figures and 1 table.)

The present paper describes an educational experiment dealing with teaching the theory of formal languages and automata as well as their application concepts. It presents a practical application of an educational experiment and initial results based on comparative instruction of two samples of students (n = 56). The application concept should improve the efficiency of the teacher's activity and professional education at the tertiary level. It could be used in disciplines having a strong logical structure and formalization. The concept is aimed at higher educational objectives such as understanding, application, analysis and synthesis. The students are presented with practical examples from their professional life--algorithmization, compilers etc. This educational method is especially recommended for teachers (in-service education) and practically oriented professionals (distance education). The results and conclusions are included in the teaching process at the Department of Computer Science University of Ostrava.

The goal of this project is to develop a unique simulation environment that can be used to increase students' interest and expertise in Computer Science curriculum. Hands-on experience with physical or simulated equipment is an essential ingredient for learning, but many approaches to training develop a separate piece of equipment or software for each topic area. We describe the development of a simulation environment that provides a foundation for cross-disciplinary exercises. The Wireless Intelligent agent Simulation Environment (WISE), which combines activities from virtual and physical versions of the Wumpus World game, provides a dynamic learning environment that can enhance a number of Computer Science courses. In this paper, we describe the WISE environment design. We also describe steps for integrating WISE into Computer Science curriculum. As a demonstration of the effectiveness of the tool, we describe its use in the artificial intelligence, multimedia, and wireless networks courses at the University of Texas at Arlington.

On September 11th, 2001 the United States experienced the largest terrorist attack in its history. This event caused many government agencies to review their security practices and procedures. It also has raised awareness of other avenues that terrorists might pursue to achieve their goals, including cyber terrorism. Cyber terrorism can be described as politically motivated attacks in cyberspace. These attacks are intended to cause grave harm, such as loss of life or severe economic damage. Often the term "weapons of mass disruption" is used in describing these potential computer-based threats. The threat of these attacks intensified the need for more computer professionals to have computer security expertise. It also pointed to the need for students studying computer related fields to be exposed to topics in computer security, particularly the threat posed by cyber terrorism. We examined a random sample of sixteen textbooks in the field of computer security to determine the coverage dedicated to cyber terrorism. Textbooks typically provide resources for faculty to teach students various topics in a course--in this case resources to help students understand the potential threats, techniques, and targets of cyber terrorists. The results show that computer security textbooks do not give cyber terrorism the depth of coverage warranted by its significance for the IT industry. Therefore, faculty need to find their own references and resources to address cyber terrorism adequately in their class. This paper concludes by providing numerous web sites and trade books that can be used to help faculty provide more information to their students on cyber terrorism. (Contains 4 tables and a list of websites and trade books that would be helpful sources of information about cyber terrorism to supplement course materials.)

Teachers at universities are facing an increasing disparity in students' prior IT knowledge and, at the same time, experience a growing disengagement of the students with regard to involvement in study activities. As computer science teachers in a joint programme in computer science and business administration, we made a number of similar observations. We also noted increasing difficulties with mathematics and see a growing number of students with previous knowledge in computer science, while others have little or no expertise in this area. These observations cause problems and present a major challenge for teachers. To get a better understanding and as a prerequisite for reforming the programme we posed four research questions: What are the students' motives and expectations with regard to the chosen study programme? To what extent are the students engaged in non-academic work activities? What prior knowledge do the students have about IT and computer science? What off campus access do the students have to IT facilities? Our findings provide a number of interesting indications. The results regarding motives and expectations suggest that there ought to be a good basis for the students to improve their efforts in computer science. However, as the majority does not know what kind of work to carry out in the future, better information about the programme and relevant jobs should be provided. Concerning the students' disengagement and its possible relation to their external workload, no conclusions can be drawn and this issue has to be researched further. The same is true about the students' expertise in mathematics. The students' previous knowledge seems to be so comprehensive that it should be considered in the teaching and inform the whole curriculum design. As there are still a substantial number of students who arrive at the programme with no previous knowledge, it is however necessary to design a syllabus and organise the course programme to accommodate different types of students. The survey also shows that IT is a natural toolset for the students, which in the future should be used more deliberately for the education. The paper provides the opportunity for other faculty to reflect on the role their students' backgrounds and expectations may play in the classroom experience. A copy of the survey is included in the appendix as a guide for those interested in conducting a similar study of their own student population. (Contains 11 tables.)

Computer science students need to learn how to write high-quality software. An important methodology for achieving quality is design-by-contract, in which code is developed together with its specification, which is given as class invariants and method pre- and postconditions. This paper describes practical experience in teaching design-by-contract and other principles of object-oriented programming and design by a comprehensive set of programming exercises. These are implemented in Java, augmented with a design-by-contract tool. The conceptual gap between the theoretical principles taught in the course and the capabilities of this programming environment causes pedagogical problems; these problems and some solutions are discussed in this paper.

This paper articulates an approach to incorporating instructor feedback in design-based research. Throughout the process of designing and implementing curriculum to support middle school students' debugging practices in a summer computer science workshop, our research and practice team utilized instructor-generated conjecture maps as boundary objects, providing insight into the instructors' reflections on their classroom teaching. We develop an analytic tool for categorizing instructors' reflections on their conjecture maps, attending specifically to how instructors push back on design choices, whether by envisioning new mediating processes, introducing new connections, discussing new design features, articulating confusion/uncertainty, and/or presenting hopes and predictions. The tool is then applied to seven instructors' daily reflections over the course of four weeks of instruction, focused on three conjecture maps. Overall, the paper documents a range of tensions that instructors encounter when aiming to provide sustained debugging support to students and introduces a tool for understanding the detailed ways that instructors critique design conjectures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]