Search for: All records

Vignettes are short stories along with a set of questions that engage the reader to comment on the story. Vignettes have been used in professional academic programs (e.g., teacher preparation and medical education), for professional development in various fields (e.g., teaching ethics in psychology and medicine), and in various research fields for data collection. In this work, vignettes are used to elicit students' understanding of dispositions in computing education. Professional dispositions enable behaviors that are valued in the workplace, such as adaptability or self-directedness. They are often explicitly stated in computing job postings. While the relevance of dispositions is widely recognized in the workplace, only recently have curricular guidelines for computing programs recognized professional dispositions as an integral part of competencies and as complementary to knowledge and skills. There is scarce literature on the use of vignettes in teaching undergraduate computing, or on how best to foster dispositions in students. In this project, four faculty from four diverse institutions in the U.S., along with three consulting experts, have collaborated to design and evaluate the use of vignettes in the classroom. This paper documents researchers' efforts to gain insights into students' perceptions of dispositions through the use of vignettes. Such insights may guide educators to identify pedagogical strategies for fostering dispositions among students. This paper presents an iterative process for vignette design with continuous review by researchers and focus group members. The vignettes in this study use stories of situations which demonstrate the application of a disposition, drawn from various fields and walks of life to represent diverse groups and experiences. Students are presented with the vignette story and asked to identify the disposition illustrated. To elicit students' understanding of dispositions in terms of their personal behaviors, students are asked to describe a situation in which they have experienced the disposition. Lessons learned in the design and use of vignettes are discussed. 

Dispositions, along with skills and knowledge, form the three components of competency-based education. Moreover, studies have shown dispositions to be necessary for a successful career. However, unlike evidence-based teaching and learning approaches for knowledge acquisition and skill development, few studies focus on translating dispositions into observable behavioral patterns. An operationalization of dispositions, however, is crucial for students to understand and achieve respective learning outcomes in computing courses. This paper describes a multi-institutional study investigating students’ understanding of dispositions in terms of their behaviors while completing coursework. Students in six computing courses at four different institutions filled out a survey describing an instance of applying each of the five surveyed dispositions (adaptable, collaborative, persistent, responsible, and self-directed) in the courses’ assignments. The authors evaluated data by using Mayring’s qualitative content analysis. The result was a coding scheme with categories summarizing students’ concepts of dispositions and how they see themselves applying dispositions in the context of computing. These results are a first step in understanding dispositions in computing education and how they manifest in student behavior. This research has implications for educators developing new pedagogical approaches to promote and facilitate dispositions. Moreover, the operationalized behaviors constitute a starting point for new assessment strategies of dispositions. 

The Computing Curricula 2020 (CC2020) report, issued by the ACM and IEEE Computer Society, identified knowledge, skills, and dispositions as the three main components of competency for undergraduate programs in computer engineering, computer science, cybersecurity, information systems, information technology, and software engineering, as well as data science. As earlier generations of curricular guidelines in computing have described knowledge and skills to some extent, the notion of dispositions is relatively new to computing. Dispositions are cultivable behaviors, such as adaptability, meticulousness, and self-directedness, that are desirable in the workplace. Multiple employer surveys and interviews confirm that dispositions are as crucial for success in the workplace as the knowledge and skills students develop in their academic programs of study. As such, the CC2020 report describes eleven dispositions that are expected of competent computing graduates. These are distinct and separate from the technical knowledge and disciplinary skills of computing and engineering. Dispositions are also distinct from baseline or cross-disciplinary skills, such as critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork, and communication. In contrast, dispositions are inherently human characteristics that describe individual qualities and behavioral patterns that lead to professional success. Dispositions are learnable, not necessarily teachable. This work-in-progress paper motivates dispositions within computing disciplines and presents the background of this approach. It also discusses the use of reflection exercises and vignettes in understanding, promoting, and fostering behavioral patterns that undergraduate computing students identify as related to dispositions they experience in the course. Preliminary data and results from the study are also presented. 

This is a panel presentation on the role of dispositions in computing education. 

Dispositions are cultivable behaviors desirable in the workplace. Examples of dispositions are being adaptable, meticulous, and self-directed. The eleven dispositions described in the CC2020 report should not be confused with the professional knowledge of computing topics, or with skills, including technical skills, along with cross-disciplinary skills such as critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork, or communication. Dispositions, more inherent to human characteristics, identify personal qualities and behavioral patterns important for successful professional careers. The leaders of this special session collaborate on a multi-institutional project funded by the National Science Foundation. Using their experiences at four higher education institutions, they will demonstrate how to foster dispositions among computing students through two hands-on activities. The audience will get first-hand experience using reflection exercises and vignettes, and will participate in debating their design, merits, and limitations. The resulting interaction will provide the audience ample time to discuss the benefits and challenges of incorporating and fostering dispositions in computing programs. It is hoped that participants will leave with concrete ideas on how to extend the current work to their own courses, programs, and institutions.