Real-time Monitoring of Student Procrastination in a PSI First-year Programming Course

Mitchell Pryor

Download Paper | Permalink

Conference: 2012 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Publication Date: June 10, 2012
Start Date: June 10, 2012
End Date: June 13, 2012
ISSN: 2153-5965
Conference Session: FPD VII: Research on First-year Programs Part II
Tagged Division: First-Year Programs
Page Count: 14
Page Numbers: 25.1099.1 - 25.1099.14
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--21856
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/21856
Download Count: 499

Paper Authors

biography

Mitchell Pryor University of Texas, Austin

visit author page

Mitch Pryor graduated with his Ph.D. from the University of Texas, Austin, in 2002 with an emphasis on robotics. He is currently a Research Scientist/Lecturer at UT, Austin, where he has taught since 2002. He has taught a variety of courses from first-year introductory programming to a graduate course in robot dynamics. His research has focused on applied robotics with an emphasis on hazardous, uncertain environments. In 2008, he co-created a graduate interdisciplinary program for developing automation solutions for nuclear applications.

visit author page

Download Paper | Permalink

Abstract

Real-time monitoring of student procrastination in a PSI first- year programming courseAbstractProcrastination is the intentional deferment of a scheduled task and is most often attributed (bythe procrastinator) to a lack of available time prior to a deadline. Although the impact ofprocrastination on student learning is widely debated, it has been correlated with a lack ofexternal (or self) regulation, motivation, and performance anxiety. These contributors stand incontrast to the commonly asserted issue. A lecture-centric course provides limited observationsfor evaluating actual student procrastination. Evidence is often subjective or anecdotal. In self-paced Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) courses, observational opportunities can befurther limited.Yet PSI can be an effective teaching strategy for course material such as that in a first-year, web-based, computer and programming course. Students (particularly first-year students) have diversebackgrounds and a varied technical literacy. In this particular course, students complete 18 unitsfollowing a traditional PSI s-curve in terms of content difficulty over the course of one semester.The content introduces students to 2 programming syntaxes and three programming paradigms(compiled, interpreted, and object-oriented languages). The PSI format allows individuals toinvest the appropriate amount of time without overwhelming new programmers orunderwhelming the more experienced. Most importantly, a well-designed PSI course may instilltime management skills (though often as a hard lesson learned), thus countering procrastinationhabits.In this paper, we present a system developed to monitor and succinctly quantify studentprocrastination in real-time and evaluate its use for evaluating new course implementations,material, and instructor strategies. The web-based system uses formulated procrastination metricsto succinctly visualize student progress. Real-time monitoring of procrastination in tandem withstudent profile data (previous programming experience, etc.) are examined to correlate theimpact of instructor encouragement, unit difficulty, external events (mid-terms, sporting events,etc.), and other activities. The system can be used to examine the collective procrastination of theclass as well as individual students or demographic categories. If effective, real-timeprocrastination monitoring becomes another tool for objectively evaluating new strategies in agiven semester also allowing for immediate adjustments benefitting current instead of just futurestudents.

Citation
Format

Pryor, M. (2012, June), Real-time Monitoring of Student Procrastination in a PSI First-year Programming Course Paper presented at 2012 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, San Antonio, Texas. 10.18260/1-2--21856

TY  - CPAPER
AB  -            Real-time monitoring of student procrastination in a PSI first-                            year programming courseAbstractProcrastination is the intentional deferment of a scheduled task and is most often attributed (bythe procrastinator) to a lack of available time prior to a deadline. Although the impact ofprocrastination on student learning is widely debated, it has been correlated with a lack ofexternal (or self) regulation, motivation, and performance anxiety. These contributors stand incontrast to the commonly asserted issue. A lecture-centric course provides limited observationsfor evaluating actual student procrastination. Evidence is often subjective or anecdotal. In self-paced Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) courses, observational opportunities can befurther limited.Yet PSI can be an effective teaching strategy for course material such as that in a first-year, web-based, computer and programming course. Students (particularly first-year students) have diversebackgrounds and a varied technical literacy. In this particular course, students complete 18 unitsfollowing a traditional PSI s-curve in terms of content difficulty over the course of one semester.The content introduces students to 2 programming syntaxes and three programming paradigms(compiled, interpreted, and object-oriented languages). The PSI format allows individuals toinvest the appropriate amount of time without overwhelming new programmers orunderwhelming the more experienced. Most importantly, a well-designed PSI course may instilltime management skills (though often as a hard lesson learned), thus countering procrastinationhabits.In this paper, we present a system developed to monitor and succinctly quantify studentprocrastination in real-time and evaluate its use for evaluating new course implementations,material, and instructor strategies. The web-based system uses formulated procrastination metricsto succinctly visualize student progress. Real-time monitoring of procrastination in tandem withstudent profile data (previous programming experience, etc.) are examined to correlate theimpact of instructor encouragement, unit difficulty, external events (mid-terms, sporting events,etc.), and other activities. The system can be used to examine the collective procrastination of theclass as well as individual students or demographic categories. If effective, real-timeprocrastination monitoring becomes another tool for objectively evaluating new strategies in agiven semester also allowing for immediate adjustments benefitting current instead of just futurestudents.
AU  - Mitchell Pryor
CY  - San Antonio, Texas
DA  - 2012/06/10
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Real-time Monitoring of Student Procrastination in a PSI First-year Programming Course
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/21856
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--21856
ER  -