isbn9789526046266

Table 10.1: Some strategies for teaching CS1
Students practice real professional skills in
authentic contexts.
Students design programs.
Students write program code.
Large and complex programming assignments.
Ill-structured programming projects; students
must manage requirements and engage in
simplifying complex problems.
Open-ended projects: tasks are expansible
according to students’ desires.
Groupwork, social participation, negotiation of
goals and/or content.
New concepts are motivated through inquiry,
e.g., “How is it possible to create a program
that does X?”
Students select their learning goals.
Students solve problems themselves.
Computing is presented in a contextualized
way that takes students’ future professions
(e.g., engineering) into account.
Assessment based on authentic programming
work in an authentic context.
The teacher leaves it to the learners to
determine what content is relevant and useful.
Limited guidance: the teacher interferes as
little as possible in the learning process.
“Jump in at the deep end (or as near to it as
you possibly can).”
Students start with fundamentals, eventually
proceeding to real professional skills.
Students examine or use given program
designs.
Students read program code.
Relatively small programming assignments.
Well-structured programming projects;
students work to a specification given by the
teacher.
Closed projects: task scope is restricted by the
assignment.
Assignments solved individually.
Students are taught about the ways in which
present content will be useful in the future.
The teacher selects learning goals.
Students study examples of problem solutions.
Computing concepts are presented in a
general, decontextualized way that is intended
to transfer to different contexts.
Exams and other artificial assessment settings.
The teacher guides learners to relevant
content.
Direct guidance: the teacher strongly controls
the learning process to maximize its efficiency.
“Wade in and take careful steps towards the
deep end.”
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