Conference Session

Computers in Education 1 - Programming 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Johannah Lynn Crandall, Washington State University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

. American c Society for Engineering Education, 2021 Work in Progress: Effects of computational aspects of differential equations (DE) course delivery on students’ computing experience in engineering instructionIntroductionRecent literature and Industry 4.0 discussions [1] have highlighted the need for engineeringgraduates to gain computational facility in all stages of ill-posed, industry-relevant problemsolving, from problem framing to understanding of and confidence in algorithm output.Chemical and mechanical engineering students grapple with both ordinary and partial differentialequations in their engineering coursework using computational methods that they may not

Conference Session

Computers in Education 1 - Programming 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Astrid K. Northrup P.E., Northwest College; Raymond Edward Floyd, Northwest College; S. Renee Dechert, Northwest College; Andrea Carneal Burrows Borowczak, University of Wyoming

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Computers in Education

and presents in several organizations (such as AERA, ASEE, ASTE, NSTA, and SITE.), and she is the current chair- elect for the ASEE PCEE Division. Before beginning her work in higher education, she taught secondary school science for 12 years in Florida and Virginia (USA). American c Society for Engineering Education, 2021CODING IS THE NEW COAL 1 Coding is the New Coal: A History of Integrating Computer Science Across Wyoming’s K-12 Curriculum Astrid K. Northrup, S. Renee Dechert, and Raymond Floyd Northwest

Conference Session

Computers in Education 1 - Programming 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Frank Vahid, zyBooks; University of California, Riverside; Roman Lysecky, University of Arizona; zyBooks; Bailey Alan Miller, University of California, Riverside; Lyssa Vanderbeek, zyBooks

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Computers in Education

variety of uses.1 IntroductionTeachers of programming courses have long wanted visibility into their students' programming behavior,such as what dates and times students programmed, how much time they spent, how often theycompiled/ran their programs, how much code they wrote between compiles/runs, and so on.However, in the past, most student programming was done in environments like Eclipse, Visual Studio,or command line tools, that didn't log such activity or make such logs readily available to teachers.Some education-focused environments evolved that logged development behavior, like BlueJ for Java,allowing research into student behavior such as [Jadud05][Jadud06]. Some teachers had students useversion control software like Git to get some

Conference Session

Computers in Education 1 - Programming 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Ben Tribelhorn, University of Portland; Heather Dillon, University of Washington Tacoma; Andrew M. Nuxoll, University of Portland; Nicole C. Ralston, University of Portland

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Computers in Education

develop an entrepreneurial mindset (EM) incomputer science students. An entrepreneurial mindset is defined by the Kern EntrepreneurialEngineering Network (KEEN) as supporting students in developing advanced skills and mindsetsto equip students to create personal, economic, and societal value [1]. Traditional computerscience education often focuses on technical and collaboration skills. The mindset is a criticalskill to develop in a software engineering course as many students can rapidly create novelapplications as demonstrated by the rise and success of mobile apps. This class was redesigned tobuild a set of skills and mindsets to focus the students on creating value.The modules described in this paper, and contextualized in purple in Figure 1

Conference Session

Computers in Education 1 - Programming 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Pat Ko, Mississippi State University; Mahnas Jean Mohammadi-Aragh, Mississippi State University; Jonathan G. Harris, Northern Gulf Institute; Jamie Lee Dyer, Mississippi State University; Yan Sun, Mississippi State University

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Computers in Education

large tasks, and deploying heuristic reasoning, iteration and search todiscover solutions to complex problems.” (Naughton, 2012). Taking a different tactic, the InternationalSociety for Technology in Education and the Computer Science Teachers Association polled teachers,researchers, and practitioners to create an operational definition that lists a set of skills and qualities,instead of stating an all-encompassing principle (ISTE & CSTA, 2011). Figure 1 shows the results of theirinquiry.Computational thinking (CT) is a problem-solving process that includes (but is not limited to) thefollowing characteristics: • Formulating problems in a way that enables us to use a computer and other tools to help solve them. • Logically

Conference Session

Computers in Education 9 - Technology 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Emre Tokgoz, Quinnipiac University; Samantha Eddi Scarpinella, Quinnipiac University; Michael Giannone, Quinnipiac University

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Computers in Education

Engineering Students for Solving Calculus Questions 1 Emre Tokgöz, 1Samantha Scarpinella, 1Michael Giannone 1 Emre.Tokgoz@qu.edu, 1 Samantha.Scarpinella@qu.edu, Michael.Giannone@qu.edu 1 Industrial Engineering, School of Engineering, Quinnipiac University, Hamden, CT, 06518, USATechnology choices of engineering students for solving calculus questions can depend on technologiesthey learned in high school, web-based resources they are aware of, major specific programmingrequirements, and technologies taught by their mathematics instructors. STEM students are usuallyexpected to demonstrate paper-pencil solution and critical thinking ability to questions while

Conference Session

Computers in Education 9 - Technology 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Chelsea L. Gordon, zyBooks, A Wiley Brand; Roman Lysecky, University of Arizona; zyBooks, A Wiley Brand; Frank Vahid, University of California, Riverside

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Computers in Education

beforestudents get feedback, which can hinder learning.Today, many courses use a cloud-based auto-grader. Students submit theirprograms to a webpage, which in seconds gives feedback on the program's runtimecorrectness along with a score. Students can then resubmit to improve their score[1], [2] aided by automated feedback [3]. The benefits include reduced humanresources, and immediate feedback to aid learning [4]. Drawbacks include little orno feedback on coding style [5], potential student overreliance on the auto-graderto test programs [6], and potential cheating of the auto-grader [7]. Some instructorscombine manual and auto-grading, letting the auto-grader provide an initial scorebased on runtime correctness, and then later manually adding a score

Conference Session

Computers in Education 9 - Technology 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Efthymia Kazakou, zyBooks, A Wiley Brand; Alex Daniel Edgcomb, zyBooks, A Wiley Brand; Yamuna Rajasekhar, zyBooks, A Wiley Brand; Roman Lysecky, University of Arizona; zyBooks, A Wiley Brand; Frank Vahid, University of California, Riverside

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Computers in Education

800universities have submitted 90 million times. Our homework activities are integrated intoweb-based interactive textbooks. Such a homework activity is a sequence of progressively moredifficult levels. A student must complete the first level's question to move on to the secondlevel's question, and so on. Each level contains numerous same-difficulty questions, one ofwhich is randomly selected when the student arrives at a level. A student's submission isauto-graded, and the student receives specific and immediate feedback to the given question andtheir submission. If the student answered incorrectly, then the student can try again on a newrandomly-generated question of the same difficulty. Our homework activity philosophy is: (1)randomized -- each

Conference Session

Computers in Education 9 - Technology 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Mahgol Nowparvar, Pennsylvania State University ; Xing Chen, Pennsylvania State University ; Omar Ashour, Pennsylvania State University ; Sabahattin Gokhan Ozden, Pennsylvania State University Abington; Ashkan Negahban, Pennsylvania State University

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Computers in Education

range of learner groups across different disciplines in engineering education. On the otherhand, there is a growing interest in using immersive technologies such as virtual reality (VR) inengineering education. While there are many literature review articles on each of these subjectsseparately, there is a lack of review articles on the application of combined PBL-VR learningenvironments in engineering education. This paper provides an assessment of the applicationsand potential of implementing immersive technologies in a PBL setting to utilize the advantagesof both paradigms. More specifically, this paper aims to provide insights related to two mainquestions: (1) where (in what disciplines/subjects) PBL and VR have been used together

Conference Session

Computers in Education 9 - Technology 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

David Beevers, Pennsylvania State University; Qi Dunsworth, Pennsylvania State University

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Computers in Education

their analysis.BackgroundHomework is a crucial part of every student’s education, especially in STEM disciplines. Thestatement that “the one who does the work does the learning,” [1] can be clearly seen in actionby any educator. However, in recent years more and more students are turning to copying andmissing this crucial part of the learning process [2]. The growth of online homework “help”websites has made it easier and easier for students to attempt to shortcut this critical step in theirlearning process. In fact, many students don’t even consider the use of such websites to completetheir homework to be cheating. [3] There have been some attempts with online homeworksystems to use randomized variables and questions to mitigate this problem

Conference Session

Computers in Education 4 - Online and Distributed Learning 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Sherif Abdelhamid, Virginia Military Institute; Andrew Katz, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

fields of human-computer interaction, human-human interaction,video content understanding, and interactive dialog systems.1. Related WorkResearchers from different fields have been using social media to gain insight into their subjectdomains, including marketing [1], healthcare [2][3], design thinking [4], cybersecurity [5],athletics [6], and natural disasters [7]. This trend is also present in engineering education. Forexample, in one study [8], researchers used Twitter to trace the participation and conversationsabout a campaign geared towards promoting STEM learning and engagement among the public.In another study [9], researchers used Twitter to understand different topics, themes, and issuesrelated to engineering education and first-year

Conference Session

Computers in Education 4 - Online and Distributed Learning 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Afrin Naz, West Virginia University Institute of Technology; Mingyu Lu, West Virginia University Institute of Technology; Ryan E. Utzman

Tagged Topics

Diversity

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Computers in Education

after the COVERAGEproject was initiated. As a result, almost all the activities had to be changed to an online platform[1], over which the participating students program robots virtually. In Fall 2020 and Spring 2021,online instructions were offered every week via Microsoft Teams, intending to guide theparticipating middle school students to program virtual robots. All the Teams sessions arerecorded and shared with all the participants, such that the middle school students could visitthem anytime. In addition to online instructions, at least one hour was designated every week forthe mentors (who are female undergraduate students) to work with the participating middleschool students on the online assignments under the supervision of middle

Conference Session

Computers in Education 4 - Online and Distributed Learning 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Julian Ly Davis, University of Southern Indiana; Thomas McDonald, University of Southern Indiana; Bradley Lane Kicklighter, University of Southern Indiana

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Computers in Education

of testingin an LMS that could be done much better to suit our individual needs. In this paper, we discusssome of the types of questions that we use in Blackboard Exams and some of the computer toolsthat we use to create them. We discuss some of the successes as well as some tricks of the tradethat we use to address our objectives. Finally, we discuss some additional tools that we use tomitigate cheating. This paper covers subjects such as: 1) Different types of Blackboard questions a. Calculated Formula b. Multiple Choice c. Fill in the Blank d. Fill in Multiple Blanks 2) Software tools to help write questions (e.g.) a. Mathematica b. Excel c. Visio 3

Conference Session

Computers in Education 4 - Online and Distributed Learning 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Juliana Lynn Fuqua, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona; Faye Linda Wachs, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona; Paul Morrow Nissenson, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona; Deanna Miranda Barrios; Cecilia Nguyen, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

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Diversity

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Computers in Education

open educational resource at the “ME Online”website (www.cpp.edu/meonline), which has accumulated over 8,600,000 views as of March2021. In 2018, a brief survey was administered to 340 mechanical engineering students at CalPoly Pomona as part of a pilot study to investigate the impact of ME Online [1]. The surveyresults were promising – the vast majority of students felt the video library made a positiveimpact on their education and helped their grades in at least one course. However, the survey didnot explore the socio-emotional impact of the video library on students nor obtain specificrecommendations of how the video library could be improved to enhance student success.The current study was designed to gain a deeper understanding of how ME

Conference Session

Computers in Education 4 - Online and Distributed Learning 1

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Sunay Palsole, Texas A&M University; Jeff Chernosky, Texas A&M University; Randy McDonald, Texas A&M University Engineering

Tagged Topics

Diversity

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Computers in Education

systems as a face-to-face course. The course may be delivered in a classroom or fromhome using live synchronous lecture capture or asynchronous lectures delivered just-in-time. Thecourse contains student-student, student-content, and student-instructor interactions. Assessmentsmay be delivered fully online or using remote methodologies. I. BACKGROUND Despite all current knowledge around student satisfaction in higher education, researcherspoint out much remains unknown. The effects of the specific course elements, individually andcollectively, when designing a course are not fully understood [1]. The multiple factorssurrounding the achievement of the learning outcomes can be related to several areas

Conference Session

Computers in Education 7 - Modulus 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Rahman Adekunle; John Kofi Eshirow Jr., University of Virginia; Jacob Lam Herring, University of Virginia; Sin Lin, University of Virginia; Rider W. Foley, University of Virginia

Tagged Topics

Diversity

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Computers in Education

computationalthinking skills needed to excel in the digital economy. One program that was created as part ofthe President’s initiative was the Research-Practitioner Partnership (RPP) grants issued by theNational Science Foundation. The program has four objectives: 1) develop a connectedcommunity of practice; 2) develop and manage a participant-driven and multi-site researchagenda; 3) convene a researcher evaluator working group to develop a process for advancing theshared-research agenda; and 4) collect qualitative and quantitative data about RPP’simplementation and common impact data. However, there has been no detailed reports or studiesof these funded RPP projects thus making their impacts difficult to observe. Thus, this researchentailed a systematic

Conference Session

Computers in Education 5 - Online and Distributed Learning 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Shamsul Arefeen, Texas Tech University; Tim Dallas P.E., Texas Tech University; Heather Greenhalgh-Spencer, Texas Tech University

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Diversity

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Computers in Education

areas ofthe world. As one of the ways to answer that need, we investigated the impact of a solar powerededucation system that is designed to deliver educational contents to less privileged people of thedeveloping world, particularly in rural locations, and mitigate the digital divide in education. Theengineered system is composed of a solar panel, battery, a pico-projector, and digital contentstored in the projector. The system unlocks the opportunity to deliver education at remotelocations where internet and electricity are not commonplace and reliable.introductionThe digital divide has been a well-researched area for decades. The divide is more of a concernwhen it affects the basic necessities, such as education and health [1]. Multiple

Conference Session

Computers in Education 7 - Modulus 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Anu Aggarwal, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

self-explanatory. Table 1: Comparison of different platforms for administering exams [1],[2]Platform Working Pros ConsGradescope Instructor needs to upload Easy to grade – can grade More time to learn the a pdf and then convert it to each question of all students software – for both an exam by pulling at the same time. instructors and students rectangles around each (around 30 minutes). question and subpart of a Can use same rubrics for question. several

Conference Session

Computers in Education 6: Best of CoED

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Sherif Abdelhamid, Virginia Military Institute; Yousef Jalali, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Andrew Katz, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

researchers answer (and raise more) importantresearch questions, support administrators in making decisions on funding and institutionalpartnerships, and help faculty members design and develop more effective programs thatfacilitate research collaborations.1. Introduction1.1 Background and MotivationResearch collaboration has become a norm and common practice within and across highereducation institutions [1,2]. Bibliometric analysis of publications over time presents anillustration of growth in faculty collaboration. Jones et al. [2] examined 4.2 million researchpapers from 1975 to 2005, including different fields, science and engineering, social science, andarts and humanity, that involved 662 universities in the U.S. and concluded that there had

Conference Session

Computers in Education 3 - Modulus I

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Larysa Nadolny, Iowa State University of Science and Technology; Md Imtiajul Alam, Iowa State University of Science and Technology; Michael Geoffrey Brown, Iowa State University of Science and Technology; Monica H. Lamm, Iowa State University of Science and Technology

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Computers in Education

-2020resulted in 176 relevant publications. Our analysis focused on document metadata and abstracts, amethodology similar to other content analyses examining journals’ trends over time. We used textmining software Leximancer 1 to examine the overall themes in the text and to investigate theevolution of game related research in five-year periods. The software provided evidence for thestatus of the field and changes over time. Leximancer applied automatic processing of the text indetermining a semantic model for critical terms and concepts, highlighting the role ofdevelopment and design, measurements of learning, and changes in term use over time. The 15year period was characterized by a focus on students, games, and learning, including topics on

Conference Session

Computers in Education 3 - Modulus I

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

James Kretzschmar, University of Wyoming; Robert F. Kubichek, University of Wyoming; Cameron H. G. Wright P.E., University of Wyoming; Steven F. Barrett, University of Wyoming; Jeffrey R. Anderson, University of Wyoming

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Computers in Education

physically built, tested,and verified using computer-based test equipment.During the Fall 2018 semester the laboratory portion of our Microcontroller course was completelyredesigned and implemented in the Spring 2019 semester (school lab). After providing initialinformation about working with the Texas Instruments Code Composer Studio IntegratedDevelopment Environment (IDE) and the MSP430 microcontroller, students completed labsinvolving the following topics: (1) Input/Output pins, (2) Basic Clock System, (3) Analog toDigital Converter, (4) Interfacing an LCD Display Module, (5) Timer Module (interrupts), (6)Timer Module (pulse width modulation), and (7) Serial Communication. In these exercises,students were required to use an oscilloscope and logic

Conference Session

Computers in Education 5 - Online and Distributed Learning 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Sunay Palsole, Texas A&M University; Jaskirat Singh Batra, Texas A&M University; Xi Zhao, Texas A&M University

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Computers in Education

surveys, but there was also the realization that a large part of the success was due to the rapport-building activity that had already occurred in the 6-8 weeks before the start of the pandemic-related closures. Subsequent student surveys toward the end of April indicated that while the students had a great appreciation of the efforts undertaken by faculty in ensuring semi-uninterrupted learning, the studentsindicated that they missed interactions. Very early studies have shown that student interaction iskey to their success in courses. Chickering and Gamson [1] consider 5 of their seven principles tobe keys for interaction and 2 among those five deals with faculty to student and student tostudent interactions. Delving into this issue of

Conference Session

Computers in Education 5 - Online and Distributed Learning 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Zhou Zhang, New York City College of Technology; Yizhe Chang, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona; Sven K. Esche, Stevens Institute of Technology; Andy S. Zhang, New York City College of Technology

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Diversity

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Computers in Education

theories, know the usage of the hardware andsoftware, and gain rich experience in robotics.Keywords: IoT, Robotics, Mechanical Engineering Technology, Framework1. IntroductionDistance/online learning 1 is becoming an important form at academic institutions, and the growthin distance/online learning has been outpacing the growth of enrollment 2,3,4. At present, thepandemic has been even further pushing distance/online learning to the peak based on the censusfrom the United States Census Bureau 5. According to the data of EducationData.org, 98% of theinstitutions have moved most of the in-person classes to the online sections 6. From the samesource, the parents have many concerns including poor content, little collaborative learning,inconsistent

Conference Session

Computers in Education 3 - Modulus I

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Thad B. Welch, Boise State University; Cameron H. G. Wright P.E., University of Wyoming; Michael G. Morrow, University of Wisconsin - Madison

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Computers in Education

attendance ofa technical conference. All of our students choose to attend this conference at their own expense.This paper will discuss these challenges and provide a selected assessment.IntroductionThe authors present one pre-COVID planned experiment and three COVID changes necessary tosupport senior and first-year graduate Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) courses. 1. The pre-COVID experiment was based on offering two senior and first-year graduate classes in a 7-week format, one following the other. Thus, a student could complete two courses (6-credits), in one semester, dealing with two closely related topics. In this case, the courses were Digital Communication Systems and Wireless Communications. 2. The first of the

Conference Session

Computers in Education 10 - Technology 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Tristan M. Ericson, York College of Pennsylvania

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

thesubject matter. It also shows students how computer tools can effectively solve largerengineering problems similar to those encountered beyond undergraduate education.1. IntroductionThis paper will not explore course design for teaching MATLAB or argue for its utility inengineering curricula. That is well-traveled ground. Many papers already demonstrate theusefulness of MATLAB and Simulink in undergraduate engineering courses. The goal here,instead, is to present techniques and strategies for using this tool in an upper-level course thathave made a marked improvement in effectiveness and student appreciation. The paper beginswhere I did with an advanced elective teaching assignment: believing that MATLAB is apowerful engineering education tool

Conference Session

Computers in Education 2 - Programming 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Safia Malallah, Kansas State University; Khaled Nasser Alsalmi, The Public Authority for Applied Education and Training; Joshua Levi Weese, Kansas State University

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Diversity

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Computers in Education

just technologyconsumers; they can use these abilities to impact the world. Policymakers have taken action toempower CT education worldwide [1], yet, not all countries have acknowledged the need forthis knowledge like Kuwait. According to the Human Development Index (HDI) in 2020,Kuwait ranked 63 out of 189 countries, with the lowest HDI score among neighbor's countries.This paper aims to measure awareness of CT in educational institutions to propose a plan thatcan promote CT in the Kuwait education system. ISTE developed a CT Model to guide theway to implement CT in K–12 education [2]. To efficiently allocate the resources, educationalresearchers suggest first estimate stakeholder awareness of the concept [3]. Because CT is arelatively new

Conference Session

Computers in Education 6: Best of CoED

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Luwen Huang, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Kayla M. Bicol; Karen E. Willcox, University of Texas at Austin

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

learning pathways of interest. Using the network model,we model the disruption due to COVID-19 related school closures in Spring 2020. Analysis onthe network model enables identification of propagating effects of the closures on later grades andreveals pathways with potential high vulnerability. When combined with school-specific and/orstudent data, this model could provide valuable analytics support to decision makers.1 IntroductionIn the spring of 2020, millions of students abruptly shifted to online instruction, and in somecases, no instruction, as COVID-19 disrupted schools nationwide. But this disruption is notsimply localized to a single semester: consider, for example, the downstream effects on a fifthgrader, who needs to master adding

Conference Session

Computers in Education 10 - Technology 2

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Jeffrey Todd McDonald, University of South Alabama; Dawn McKinney, University of South Alabama; Todd R. Andel, University of South Alabama

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Computers in Education

Digital Logic courses in Computer Science curriculum, andfor recruiting undergraduate researchers in cybersecurity related disciplines. We relate anecdotalsuccess in using the tool for such engagements and context for student involvement as part of anobject-oriented and agile software engineering project.1. IntroductionDigital logic instruction is typically a core component of Computer Science (CS), ElectricalEngineering (EE), and Computer Engineering (CpE) curricula. Most often, students are exposedto digital logic concepts early in their programs as a foundational steppingstone. CS students donot typically explore digital logic concepts further during their programs except as backgroundknowledge for courses like Computer Architecture or

Conference Session

Computers in Education 6: Best of CoED

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Nabeel Alzahrani, University of California, Riverside; Frank Vahid, University of California, Riverside

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

manually, while some schools used custom-built auto-graders, or made use of thefreely-available Web-CAT tool [1]. However, in the past few years, several cloud-based commercialauto-graders have appeared, such as zyBooks [2], Gradescope [3], Mimir [4], Vocareum [5], CodeLab[6], and MyProgramming-Lab [7], many emphasizing ease of use and immediate score feedback tostudents. Based on public information from and direct discussions with those companies, we canconservatively state that at least 500 universities and at least 1,000 courses have switched from manualgrading to auto-grading in recent years, impacting well over 250,000 students per year. According to arecent whitepaper from zyBooks, there is a steep rise in the use of auto-graders in recent

Conference Session

Computers in Education 6: Best of CoED

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Molly Rebecca Domino, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Margaret O'Neil Ellis; Dennis Kafura

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Diversity

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Computers in Education

Computational Thinking course for non-majors. An initialquantitative evaluation of the visualizations raised questions about their long-term effectivenessand ease of use. This study represents a qualitative study done to gain deeper insight into theexperiences of students. The results of this study demonstrated students were engaging withcourse materials in unexpected ways but frequently referred back to the visualizations.Additionally, students had an approach to understanding the visualizations that was both helpfuland problematic. These findings help to inform visualization and curriculum designers aboutstudent attitudes and strategies in using course materials.1 IntroductionDue to the abstract nature of Computer Science it is not uncommon for