We live in a digital age, not least accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. It is all the more important in our society that students learn and master the key competence of algorithmic thinking to understand the informatics concepts behind every digital phenomena and thus is able to actively shape the future. For this to be successful, concepts must…

Prior programming knowledge of students has a major impact on introductory programming courses. Those with prior experience often seem to breeze through the course. Those without prior experience see others breeze through the course and disengage from the material or drop out. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that novice student…

Computational Thinking (CT) has emerged in recent years as a thematic trend in education in many countries and several initiatives have been developed for its inclusion in school curricula. There are many pedagogical strategies to promote the development of elementary school students' CT skills and knowledge. Unplugged learning tasks, block-based…

The teaching and learning of programming has proven to be a challenge for students of computer courses, since it presents challenges and requires complex skills for the good development of students. The traditional teaching model is not able to motivate students and arouse their interest in the topic. The tool proposed herein, the REA-LP, aims to…

Learning programming logic remains an obstacle for students from different academic fields. Considered one of the essential disciplines in the field of Science and Technology, it is vital to investigate the new tools or techniques used in the teaching and learning of Programming Language. This work presents a systematic literature review (SLR) on…

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) have become hugely popular recently. MOOCs can offer high-quality education for anyone interested and equalize the whole education field. Still, there are different methodologies for running MOOCs. Coming up with the most suitable methodology benefits both students and teachers. In this study, we have limited…

Integrating computational thinking into K-12 Education has been a widely explored topic in recent years. Particularly, effective assessment of computational thinking can support the understanding of how learners develop computational concepts and practices. Aiming to help advance research on this topic, we propose a data-driven approach to assess…

The new Croatian Informatics curriculum, which introduces computational thinking concepts into learning outcomes has been put into practice. A computational thinking assessment model reflecting the learning outcomes of the Croatian curriculum was created using an evidence-centered design approach. The possibility of assessing the computational…

Object-oriented programming distinguishes between instance attributes and methods and class attributes and methods, annotated by the "static" modifier. Novices encounter difficulty understanding the means and implications of "static" attributes and methods. The paper has two outcomes: (a) a detailed classification of aspects of…

This study reports the findings of a program that aims to develop pre-service science teachers' computational problem-solving skills and views on using information and communications technology in science education. To this end, pre-service science teachers were trained on computational thinking, computational problem solving, designing an…

When we "think like a computer scientist," we are able to systematically solve problems in different fields, create software applications that support various needs, and design artefacts that model complex systems. Abstraction is a soft skill embedded in all those endeavours, being a main cornerstone of computational thinking. Our…

Introductory programming courses (CS1) are difficult for novices. Inspired by "Problem solving followed by instruction" and "Productive Failure" approaches, we define an original "necessity-driven" learning design. Students are put in an apparently well-known situation, but this time they miss an essential ingredient…

Teaching software engineering (SWE) as a core computer science course (ACM, 2013) is a challenging task. The challenge lies in the emphasis on what a large-scale software means, implementing teamwork, and teaching abstraction in software design while simultaneously engaging students into reasonable coding tasks. The abstraction of the system…

Concurrency is often perceived as difficult by students. One reason for this may be due to the fact that abstractions used in concurrent programs leave more situations undefined compared to sequential programs (e.g., in what order statements are executed), which makes it harder to create a proper mental model of the execution environment. Students…

Controlling complexity through the use of abstractions is a critical part of problem solving in programming. Thus, becoming proficient with procedural and data abstraction through the use of user-defined functions is important. Properly using functions for abstraction involves a number of other core concepts, such as parameter passing, scope and…