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Debugging is a cornerstone of programming and has been shown to be especially problematic for beginners. While there has been some work trying to understand the difficulties that beginners face with debugging, investigating common mistakes or specific error types they struggle with, there is little work that focuses on in-depth analysis of how novice programmers approach debugging, and how it changes over time. In this paper, we present MAADS (MixedMethods Approach for the Analysis of Debugging Sequences), a scalable and generalizable approach that combines quantitative and qualitative methods by using a state/action representation and visualization to gain knowledge about the debugging process through a step by step analysis. To demonstrate the utility of MAADS, we analyzed the debugging processes of middle school students who developed code within May’s Journey, a game designed to teach basic programming principles. The approach showed great utility in identifying differences in students’ debugging techniques and learning paths. 

There are several educational games and tools that teach program- ming. However, very few offer a deep understanding of Computer Science concepts such as Abstraction, Modularity, Semantics, and Debugging. We present May’s Journey, an educational game that supports learning of basic programming concepts, where players solve puzzles and interact with the environment by typing in a cus- tom programming language. The game design seamlessly integrates learning goals, core mechanics, and narrative elements. We discuss how we integrate the CS concepts mentioned above using game mechanic metaphors. 

Integrating narrative elements into a game is a key element in de- signing an immersive experience. Narrative has been hypothesized to improve engagement, motivation, and learning within educational environments. While empirical results have been produced to show that narrative enhances engagement and motivation, its effects on learning were shown to either be insignificant or negative. We, there- fore, aim to address the question of how to integrate narrative in a game to improve learning. We address this through the design of May’s Journey, an educational game that teaches basic programming concepts where a story is integrated. The game design seamlessly integrates learning goals, core mechanic and narrative elements. In this paper, we discuss the game design as well as a study we con- ducted to compare two game versions, one with rich narrative and the other with light narrative. Results demonstrate that participants who interacted with the rich narrative version had fewer program- ming errors and increased engagement within the game. We present our contributions in the form of educational design principles for narrative integration supported by our study and results.