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Novice programmers often struggle with code understanding and debugging. Live Programming environments visualize the runtime values of a program each time it is modified to provide immediate feedback, which help with tracing the program execution. This paper presents the use of a Live Programming tool in a CS1 course to better understand the impact of Live Programming on novices’ learning metrics and their perceptions of the tool. We conducted a within-subjects study at a large public university in a CS1 course in Python (N=237) where students completed tasks in a lab setting, in some cases with a Live Programming environment, and in some cases without. Through post-lab surveys and open-ended feedback, we measured how well students understood the material and how students perceived the programming environment. To understand the impact of Live Programming, we compared the collected data for students who used Live Programming with the data for students who did not. We found that while learning outcomes were the same regardless of whether Live Programming was used or not, students who used the Live Programming tool completed some code tracing tasks faster. Furthermore, students liked the Live Programming environment more, and rated it as more helpful for their learning. 

One of the goals of computing education research is to document the potential strengths and weaknesses of contemporary teaching methods in computing. Live coding has recently gained attention as one of the best practices for teaching programming. To offer a more comprehensive understanding of the existing body of research about live coding, we reviewed papers in computing education research that investigated the value of live coding in an educational setting. We categorized each paper based on (1) how it defines live coding, (2) whether its version of live coding could be considered active learning, (3) the type of study conducted, (4) types of data collected and the data analysis methods used, (5) evidence provided for the effectiveness of live coding, (6) reported benefits and drawbacks of live coding, and (7) reported theoretical frameworks used to explain the basis, effects or goals of live coding. We found that although live coding has been recommended as one of the best practices for teaching programming, there is a lack of empirical evidence to support claims about the effectiveness of live coding on student learning. Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings and suggest future research directions that could develop a more holistic understanding of this pedagogical technique.