A Comparison of Different Approaches to the Introductory Programming Course

Goldweber, M., Bergin, J., Lister, R. and McNally, M.F.

Over the last few years the number of visual and non-traditional programming environments to support the introductory programming course has greatly increased. While in the past, instructors of the introductory programming course simply had to select a compiler (and possibly a development environment), today they face a plethora of choices. This panel will present four such popular visual /non traditional programming environments. A common thread among these environments is that they all seek to continuously illustrate/visualize the complete program state throughout program execution. The underlying pedagogic assumption is that such continuous non-textual visual feedback is superior for introductory students than more traditional programming languages/environments; where program state feedback is strictly textual, limited in scope, and periodic (e.g. cout statements). This panel will not only present four such popular programming environments, but, since each approach has its own strengths and weaknesses, engage the audience in a discussion comparing and contrasting them as well.

Cite as: Goldweber, M., Bergin, J., Lister, R. and McNally, M.F. (2006). A Comparison of Different Approaches to the Introductory Programming Course. In Proc. Eighth Australasian Computing Education Conference (ACE2006), Hobart, Australia. CRPIT, 52. Tolhurst, D. and Mann, S., Eds. ACS. 11-13.

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