ACM Transactions on Computing Education

In this editorial, we introduce the second set of papers for the special issue “Conceptualizing and Using Theory in CER”. These papers focus on meta level discussion on theories in CER, addressing the definition of theories, what theoretical contributions ...

In this paper, I reflect on how my personal conceptions on “theory” have developed and become more diverse and elaborated during my career. I discuss early conceptions I learned in school and during my university studies, followed by the growing awareness ...

In this article, I interrogate the relation between a researcher and the theories that the researcher gets involved with. I use my own trajectory as a computing education researcher as a way to make visible how different conceptions of this relation are ...

A rich body of empirically grounded results and a solid theory base have often been viewed as signs of a mature discipline. Many disciplines have frequently debated what they should accept as legitimate kinds of theories, the proper roles of theory, and ...

The use of established and discipline-specific theories within research and practice is an indication of the maturity of a discipline. With computing education research as a relatively young discipline, there has been recent interest in investigating ...

Use of theory within a field of research provides the foundation for designing effective research programs and establishing a deeper understanding of the results obtained. This, together with the emergence of domain-specific theory, is often taken as an ...

The overall aim of this article is to stimulate discussion about the activities within CER, and to develop a more thoughtful and explicit perspective on the different types of research activity within CER, and their relationships with each other. While ...

Several authors of articles in the special issue came together for an asynchronous discussion of the articles, surfacing several tensions and opportunities for future work. This summary of the discussion offers a glimpse into these insights.

Motivation. As K-12 computing education becomes more established throughout the world, there is an increasing focus on accessibility for all, whether in a particular country or setting or in areas of the world that may not yet have computing established. ...

Objectives. Java is a popular programming language for use in computing education, but it is difficult to get a wide picture of the issues that it presents for novices; most studies look only at the types or frequency of errors. In this observational ...

Prior studies in the Computer Science education literature have illustrated that novices make many mistakes in composing SQL queries. Query formulation proves to be difficult for students. Only recently, some headway was made towards understanding why SQL ...

Research Problem. Computer science (CS) education researchers conducting studies that target high school students have likely seen their studies impacted by COVID-19. Interpreting research findings impacted by COVID-19 presents unique challenges that will ...

This article reviews literature on worked examples in the context of programming activities. We focus on two types of examples, namely, code-tracing and code-generation, because there is sufficient research on these to warrant a review. We synthesize key ...

Programming education is strongly emerging in elementary and high school. Diversity and inclusion are important topics, however, insights on suited programming materials for younger learners with visual impairments are lacking. A wide range of programming ...

Modeling is an integral part of many computing-related disciplines and thus also represents a curricular core component in computing education in tertiary education. Competence models in which modeling is integrated at least to some extent already exist ...

Many practitioners might struggle with becoming productive in different software engineering (SE) roles due to misalignment of the skills learnt during the university time with what is expected in the industry. Companies spend significant resources to ...