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1. Scaffolding the Debugging Process in Physical Computing with Circuit Check

   Schneider, Michael (January 2022, 15th International Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL))

   Physical computing projects provide rich opportunities for students to design, construct, and program machines that can sense and interact with the environment. However, students engaging in these activities often struggle to decipher the behavior of hardware components, software, and the interaction between the two. I report on the experiences of middle school students using a software tool, Circuit Check, designed to scaffold the debugging process in physical computing systems. Through think-aloud problem-solving exercises, I found Circuit Check facilitated rich instructor-student discussions. Incorporating these preliminary observations, I discuss design considerations for physical computing tools that support productive struggles and student sense-making 

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2. Where's the Bug?: Helping Students Find Errors in Physical Computing

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3478432.3499059  

   Schneider, Michael (March 2022, Proceedings of the 53rd ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 2)

   Popular platforms for teaching physical computing like the LilyPad Arduino and Adafruit Circuit Playground have simplified programming and wiring, enabling students to quickly engineer physical computing projects. But enabling students to rapidly design and build is a double-edged sword: Students can create functioning prototypes without fully understanding the underlying principles. With limited knowledge and experience, students struggle to locate and fix bugs, or errors, in their projects. Absent appropriate debugging tools, students rely on their instructor for locating errors, or worse, turn toward destructive tactics such as tearing apart and rebuilding their project, hoping the bug fixes itself. Students need tools targeted to their ability that scaffold debugging and help them locate bugs in the mixed hardware/software environment of physical computing. I developed Circuit Check to scaffold the debugging process for students. It enables students to observe real-time sensor data and test hardware components through a novel adaptation of the traditional breakpoint for physical computing. 

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3. How do Teaching Practices and Use of Software Features Relate to Computer Science Student Belonging in Synchronous Remote Learning Environments?

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3545945.3569876  

   Cowit, Noah Q; Barker, Lecia (March 2023, ACM)

   When faculty behaviors foster students’ sense of belonging in class, students report better learning experiences and are more likely to remain in the major. Sense of belonging is the feeling of being a valued and legitimate member of a community. Understanding teacher immediacy behaviors that cultivate belonging in postsecondary synchronous remote classrooms is important for retaining students in computing, where remote coursework is increasingly used to address increases in enrollment. This paper reports on an exploratory, survey-based study on the relationship between instructor immediacy behaviors and use of conferencing software features (e.g., chat, breakout rooms) with student sense of belonging in synchronous remote learning environments. Responses from 125 computing students from approximately 53 courses across the US show that students feel a moderate sense of belonging in their courses, with no differences found across demographic groups. Belonging was found to have a strong relationship with students' overall opinions of their courses and their likelihood of completing the major. Students’ camera preferences and instructor camera requirements had no effect on belonging. A regression analysis showed that no tool use variables predicted student sense of belonging. However, two teacher immediacy behaviors, setting aside class time to talk about upcoming course content and use of humor, were significantly associated with an increase in sense of belonging. 

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4. Opunit: Sanity Checks for Computing Environments

   https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39306-9_12  

   Mirhosseini, Samim; Parnin, Chris (January 2020, Lecture notes in computer science)

   Computing environments, including virtual machines and containers, are essential components of modern software engineering infrastructure. Despite emerging tools that support the creation and configuration of computing environments, they are limited in testing and validating the construction of these environments. Furthermore, professionals and students new to these concepts, lack feedback on their construction efforts. In this paper, we argue that the design of environment testing tools should fundamentally support asserting essential properties, such as reachability and availability, in order to maximize usability and utility. We present opunit, an environment testing tool that supports assertion of these properties. We describe properties students failed to check when testing computing environments, which guided the design of opunit. Finally, we share our early experiences with using opunit in the classroom to support education and training in configuration of computing environments. 

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5. Pair debugging of electronic textiles projects: Analyzing think-aloud protocols for high school students’ strategies and practices while problem solving.

   Jayathirtha, G.; Fields, D. A.; Kafai, Y. B. (January 2020, The Interdisciplinarity of the Learning Sciences, 14th International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS) 2020)

   Gresalfi, M.; Horn, I. (Ed.)

   Much attention has focused on student learning while making physical computational artifacts such as robots or electronic textiles, but little is known about how students engage with the hardware and software debugging issues that often arise. In order to better understand students’ debugging strategies and practices, we conducted and video-recorded eight think- aloud sessions (~45 minutes each) of high school student pairs debugging electronic textiles projects with researcher-designed programming and circuitry/crafting bugs. We analyzed each video to understand pairs’ debugging strategies and practices in navigating the multi- representational problem space. Our findings reveal the importance of employing system-level strategies while debugging physical computing systems, and of coordinating between various components of physical computing systems, for instance between the physical artifact, representations on paper, and the onscreen programming environment. We discuss the implications of our findings for future research and designing instruction and tools for learning with and debugging physical computing systems. 

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