|
| | | |
What does 'objects-first' mean? An international study of teachers' perceptions of objects-first
Bennedsen, J. and Schulte, C.
In this article we study how teachers of objects-first
versions of CS1 courses all over the world understand the
term �objects-first'.
By analysing the descriptions of the term objects-first
from more than 200 teachers worldwide, we have found
and described three categories: using objects, creating
classes, and concepts. A second study of more than 40
teachers was undertaken to validate our suggested
descriptions.
Implications of the three categories are described. These
were determined by analysing whether the three
categories lead to different evaluations of typical CS1
topics. The differences are analysed in relation to three
dimensions: the relevance of the topic, how difficult
teachers think students find the topic and the level at
which students are supposed to learn the topic. Overall,
only small differences between the categories are found.
The three categories characterize a little over 50% of the
courses; the rest use a combination of the three categories. |
Cite as: Bennedsen, J. and Schulte, C. (2007). What does 'objects-first' mean? An international study of teachers' perceptions of objects-first. In Proc. Seventh Baltic Sea Conference on Computing Education Research (Koli Calling 2007), Koli National Park, Finland. CRPIT, 88. Lister, R. and Simon, Eds. ACS. 21-29. |
(from crpit.com)
(local if available)
|
|