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1. Self-Efficacy Study in Computing Among College Freshmen

   Ghimire, Amrita; Lee, S.; Lineberry, L. (July 2020, ASEE Annual Conference proceedings)

   Computer Science (CS) is not introduced equitably across K-12 schools, yet it is increasingly a necessary skill regardless of vocational pathway. Co-curricular activities such as summer camps have become a popular way to introduce CS to K-12 students. Researchers at our institution, through partnerships with other educational institutions and practitioners, developed a transdisciplinary approach of teaching CS in K-12 informal learning environments. Building on positive results in the K-12 informal learning environment, researchers are exploring the applicability of the transdisciplinary modules in formal instruction for early college learners in CS0 and CS1 courses. This paper explores self-efficacy data collected from multiple CS0 and CS1 courses. Learners include freshmen in computing majors and in non-computing majors. We compare their self efficacy growth in computing across race and gender, considering their formal or informal CS education experiences prior to entering college. This work is a part of a larger effort to redesign CS0 and CS1 courses to introduce more complex concepts and important design concepts such as parallel and distributed computing earlier in the curriculum. The authors’ longer-term goal is to investigate active learning strategies that will introduce higher level computer science topics early in the curriculum to enable students to recognize content applicability earlier in their college pathway. 

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2. An Introductory Internet of Things Curriculum for Grades 9-12 Computer Science Classes

   https://doi.org/10.1109/FIE56618.2022.9962612  

   Abichandani, Pramod; Lobo, Deepan; Shekhar, Prateek (October 2022, 2022 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE))

   The emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT) has had a transformative effect on our society and has inspired educators to develop innovative approaches to educate the next generation of Computer Science (CS) professionals. This paper presents the design and development of an introductory IoT course suitable for grades 9-12 Computer Science classes. Information about the course content, intended outcomes, and evaluation techniques are presented. The course was introduced in 2 high schools in the US. The course includes a capstone project where the students identified a real-world problem and developed an IoT-based solution to address it. Formative and summative technical evaluation results are presented and suggest that the course provided an effective learning experience for students. The information presented here provides guiding principles for developing an IoT-based curriculum geared towards 9-12 education while also exposing the students to CS fundamental. 

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3. Designing Ethically-Integrated Assignments: It’s Harder Than it Looks

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3568813.3600126  

   Brown, Noelle; South, Koriann; Venkatasubramanian, Suresh; Wiese, Eliane S. (August 2023, Proceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research V.1)

   While the CS education community has successfully incorporated tech-ethics assignments and modules into computing courses, we lack a defined process for instructional design to create these materials from scratch across the curriculum. To enable the development of such a process, we explore two research questions: (1) What specific instructional design challenges emerge when creating ethically-integrated assignments for CS courses? And (2) what strategies might overcome them? We address these questions using Research through Design, a method for critically examining design processes. Applying this method to our own process of creating ethics-integrated CS assignments yielded four key challenges: identifying an ethical context, maintaining a technical focus, eliciting both ethical and technical thinking from students, and making the assignment practical for the classroom. Further, the Research through Design approach revealed process-level insights for addressing these challenges, which can apply across the computing curriculum. This paper also serves as a case study of Research through Design for CS education, highlighting the importance of the instructional design process and the behind-the-scenes challenges and design decisions that go into tech-ethics materials. 

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4. The CLICK Approach and its Impact on Learning Introductory Probability Concepts in an Industrial Engineering Course

   Lopez, Christian; Ashour, Omar; Cunningham, James; Tucker, Conrad; Lynch, Paul (June 2020, ASEE Annual Conference proceedings)

   The objective of this work is to present an initial investigation of the impact the Connected Learning and Integrated Course Knowledge (CLICK) approach has had on students’ motivation, engineering identity, and learning outcomes. CLICK is an approach that leverages Virtual Reality (VR) technology to provide an integrative learning experience in the Industrial Engineering (IE) curriculum. To achieve this integration, the approach aims to leverage VR learning modules to simulate a variety of systems. The VR learning modules offer an immersive experience and provide the context for real-life applications. The virtual simulated system represents a theme to transfer the system concepts and knowledge across multiple IE courses as well as connect the experience with real-world applications. The CLICK approach has the combined effect of immersion and learning-by-doing benefits. In this work, VR learning modules are developed for a simulated manufacturing system. The modules teach the concepts of measures of location and dispersion, which are used in an introductory probability course within the IE curriculum. This work presents the initial results of comparing the motivation, engineering identity, and knowledge gain between a control and an intervention group (i.e., traditional vs. CLICK teaching groups). The CLICK approach group showed greater motivation compared to a traditional teaching group. However, there were no effects on engineering identity and knowledge gain. Nevertheless, it is hypothesized that the VR learning modules will have a positive impact on the students’ motivation, engineering identity, and knowledge gain over the long run and when used across the curriculum. Moreover, IE instructors interested in providing an immersive and integrative learning experience to their students could leverage the VR learning modules developed for this project. 

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5. Authentic Learning Secure Software Development (SSD) in Computing Education

   https://doi.org/10.1109/FIE.2018.8659217  

   Qian, Kai; Lo, Dan; Parizi, Reza; Wu, Fan; Agu, Emmanuel; Chu, Bei-Tseng (October 2018, IEEE Frontiers in Education (FIE) Conference)

   As mobile computing is now becoming more and more popular, the security threats to mobile applications are also growing explosively. Mobile app flaws and security defects could open doors for hackers to break into them and access sensitive information. Most vulnerabilities should be addressed in the early stage of mobile software development. However, many software development professionals lack awareness of the importance of security vulnerability and the necessary security knowledge and skills at the development stage. The combination of the prevalence of mobile devices and the rapid growth of mobile threats has resulted in a shortage of secure software development professionals. Many schools offer mobile app development courses in computing curriculum; however, secure software development is not yet well represented in most schools' computing curriculum. This paper addresses the needs of authentic and active pedagogical learning materials for SSD and challenges of building Secure Software Development (SSD) capacity through effective, engaging, and investigative approaches. In this paper, we present an innovative authentic and active SSD learning approach through a collection of transferrable learning modules with hands-on companion labs based on the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) recommendations. The preliminary feedback from students is positive. Students have gained hands-on real world SSD learning experiences with Android mobile platform and also greatly promoted self-efficacy and confidence in their mobile SSD learning. 

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