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1. Using Developer Eye Movements to Externalize the Mental Model Used in Code Summarization Tasks

   Abid, N.; Maletic, J.I.; Sharif, B. (June 2019, 11th ACM Symposium on Eye tracking Research and Applications (ETRA))

   cognition model (i.e., bottom-up or top-down) applied during program comprehension tasks. The cognition models examine how programmers understand source code by describing the temporary information structures in the programmer’s short term memory. The two types of models that we are interested in are top-down and bottom-up. The top-down model is normally applied as-needed (i.e., the domain of the system is familiar). The bottom-up model is typically applied when a developer is not familiar with the domain or the source code. An eye-tracking study of 18 developers reading and summarizing Java methods is used as our dataset for analyzing the mental cognition model. The developers provide a written summary for methods assigned to them. In total, 63 methods are used from five different systems. The results indicate that on average, experts and novices read the methods more closely (using the bottom-up mental model) than bouncing around (using top-down). However, on average novices spend longer gaze time performing bottom-up (66s.) compared to experts (43s.) 

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2. Making Inspired by Nature: Engaging Preservice Elementary Teachers and Children in Maker-centered learning and Biomimicry

   Williams, D. C. (June 2019, ASEE annual conference & exposition proceedings)

   Makerspaces, innovation labs, and creativity spaces are gaining traction in K-12 schools and community centers. This exploratory project, Making Inspired by Nature, brings together the art of making, the disciplined practices of design thinking, and the creative practices of biomimicry to engage preservice teachers and children in building innovative solutions to real-world problems. To achieve this, this project is (a) building and evaluating digital resources and hands-on activities for engaging elementary children in innovation through the application of biomimicry and design thinking in a maker context and (b) evaluating models for deepening pre-service teachers’ pedagogical knowledge for supporting student learning in maker-centered classrooms. This NSF IUSE funded project, just ending year 1 of a 2-year project, was in response to an NSF Dear Colleague Letter calling for EAGER proposals to conduct exploratory work with respect to STEM learning and design thinking. 

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3. The role of community science in orthopteran research

   https://doi.org/10.3897/jor.32.90444  

   Byerly, Amy R.; Firneno Jr., Thomas J.; Beard, Riley; Larson, Erica L. (May 2023, Journal of Orthoptera Research)

   Orthopterans are commonly encountered in rural, suburban, and urban landscapes and have charismatic songs that attract the public’s attention. These are ideal organisms for connecting the public with science and critical concepts in ecology and evolution, such as habitat conservation and climate change. In this review, we provide an overview of community science and review community science in orthopterans. Best practices for orthopteran community science are provided, with a focus on audio recordings and highlighting new ways in which scientists who study orthopterans can engage in community science. 

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4. Understanding and Mitigating Challenges for Non-Profit Driven Indie Game Development to Innovate Game Production

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3544548.3580976  

   Freeman, Guo; Li, Lingyuan; Mcneese, Nathan; Schulenberg, Kelsea (April 2023, CHI '23: Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems)

   Non-profit driven indie game development represents a growing open and participatory game production model as an alternative to the traditional mainstream gaming industry. However, this community is also facing and coping with tensions and dilemmas brought by its focus on artistic and cultural values over economic benefits. Using 28 interviews with indie game developers with a non-profit agenda across various cultures, we investigate the challenges non-profit driven indie game developers face, which mainly emerge in their personal or collaborative labor and their endeavors to secure sustainable resources and produce quality products. Our investigation extends the current HCI knowledge of the democratization of technology and its impact on the trajectory of innovating, designing, and producing future (gaming) technologies. These insights may help increase the opportunities for and retention of previously underrepresented groups in technology production and inform effective decision/policy making to better support the creativity industry in the future. 

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5. Scaffolding Game Design: Towards Tool Support for Planning Open-Ended Projects in an Introductory Game Design Class

   https://doi.org/10.1109/VL/HCC51201.2021.9576209  

   Card, Alexander; Wang, Wengran; Martens, Chris; Price, Thomas (October 2021, Proceedings of the Visual Languages and Human-centered Computing Conference (VL/HCC))

   One approach to teaching game design to students with a wide variety of disciplinary backgrounds is through team game projects that span multiple weeks, up to an entire term. However, open-ended, creative projects introduce a gamut of challenges to novice programmers. Our goal is to assist game design students with the planning stage of their projects. This paper describes our data collection process through three course interventions and student interviews, and subsequent analysis in which we learned students had difficulty expressing their creative vision and connecting the game mechanics to the intended player experience. We present these results as a step towards the goal of scaffolding the planning process for student game projects, supporting more creative ideas, clearer communication among team members, and a stronger understanding of human-centered design in software development. 

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