In this article, we examine the use of electronic textiles (e-textiles) for introducing key computational concepts and practices while broadening perceptions about computing. The starting point of our work was the design and implementation of a curriculum module using the LilyPad Arduino in a pre-AP high school computer science class. To…

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…

Georgia Computes! ("GaComputes") was a six-year (2006-2012) project to improve computing education across the state of Georgia in the United States, funded by the National Science Foundation. The goal of GaComputes was to broaden participation in computing and especially to engage more members of underrepresented groups which includes…

In the United States, the number of students entering into and completing degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) areas has declined significantly over the past decade. Although modest increases have been shown in enrollments in computer-related majors in the past 4 years, the prediction is that even in 3 to 4 years…

We describe our experiences teaching MapReduce in a large undergraduate lecture course using public cloud services and the standard Hadoop API. Using the standard API, students directly experienced the quality of industrial big-data tools. Using the cloud, every student could carry out scalability benchmarking assignments on realistic hardware,…

Lecturing is known to be a controversial form of teaching. With massed classrooms, in particular, it tends to constrain the active participation of students. One of the remedies applied to programming education is to use technology that can vitalize interaction in the classroom, while another is to base teaching increasingly on programming…

This article investigates the effectiveness of a course employing a discipline-based computing approach. The research questions driving this study were: (1) Can experiences with discipline-based computing promote students' acquisition and application of foundational computing concepts and procedures? (2) How do students perceive and…

Computing science students amass years of programming experience and a wealth of factual knowledge in their undergraduate courses. Based on our combined years of experience, however, one of our students' abiding shortcomings is that they think there is only "one correct answer" to issues in most courses: an "idealistic"…

Peer Instruction (PI) is an active learning pedagogical technique. PI lectures present students with a series of multiple-choice questions, which they respond to both individually and in groups. PI has been widely successful in the physical sciences and, recently, has been successfully adopted by computer science instructors in lower-division,…

This article discusses the evolution of a single undergraduate computer graphics course over five semesters, driven by a primary question: if one could offer only one undergraduate course in graphics, what would it include? This constraint is relevant to many small and medium-sized colleges that lack resources, adequate expertise, and enrollment…

This article presents the design and implementation of a complete review of undergraduate digital hardware design teaching in the School of Engineering at the University of Edinburgh. Four guiding principles have been used in this exercise: learning-outcome driven teaching, deep learning, affordability, and flexibility. This has identified…

We present the results of an interview study investigating student experiences in two online introductory computer science courses. Our theoretical approach is situated at the intersection of two research traditions: "distance and adult education research," which tends to be sociologically oriented, and "computer science education research," which…

The teaching-research nexus concept has been extensively examined in the higher education literature, and the importance of industry linkages in information and communications technology (ICT) education has also been widely discussed. However, to date there has been little recognition of the full extent of relationships between aspects of…

One of the goals of using robots in introductory programming courses is to increase motivation among learners. There have been several types of robots that have been used extensively in the classroom to teach a variety of computer science concepts. A more recently introduced robot designed to teach programming to novice students is the Institute…

Usability and accessibility have become increasingly important in computing curricula. This article briefly reviews how these concepts may be included in existing courses. The authors conducted a survey of student attitudes toward these issues at the start and end of a usability engineering course that included a group project with an…