It is well understood and has been well documented that there is much to gain by using live projects in the computer science classroom [1-13]. Live projects include those that serve a real client with a real problem as well as those those that integrate live datasets. However, the use of live projects has always come with a variety of challenges including supporting the project once it is complete, providing secure and safe access to large data sets, adjusting live client expectations, and limiting the scope of a project to the context of a single term and within the learning outcomes. The purpose of this special session is to provide attendees an introduction to and examples of the way that live projects have been integrated throughout the computing curriculum at Radford University.

Research is presented that examined the effects of various measures of prior computer science experience and cognitive abilities on overall performance in a CS2 course. Participants selected from the CS2 course at two southeastern state universities were used within this study, resulting in a sample size of 161 (School A, n = 76; School B, n = 85). School A is a mid-sized comprehensive university and School B is a large research-intensive university.Self-reported data were collected on measures of experience in object-oriented processing, UNIX programming, web design, computing platforms, and various CS experience. Further, cognitive abilities measures of spatial orientation, visualization, logical reasoning, and flexibility were administered.The results show that the schools significantly differed on all measures of cognitive ability and most measures of prior computer science experience. The schools also differed on the extent to which these measures were related to overall course performance. The results suggest that, for school A, the cognitive ability visualization and the prior computer science experience measure of OO processing were significantly related to course performance. However, when examining school B, no measures were found significant.

No abstract available.

CPSC 120, Principles of Computer Science I, is a first semester freshmen level course for computer science majors. Over a three semester comparison period, this course had an average WDF rate of 56% (i.e. percentage of students receiving a grade of “D” or “F”, or withdrawing from the course). In two sections of this course, two strategies, peer instruction and cooperative learning, were combined to lower the WDF rate for both sections to an average of 32.5%. The improvement was even more dramatic for the female students in the classes, who improved from a 53% WDF rate to a WDF rate of only 15%.

Article Free Access Share on Development and evaluation of a taxonomical model of behavioral representation techniques Authors: J. D. Chase Department of Computer Science, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VA Department of Computer Science, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VAView Profile , Robert S. Schulman Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VA Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VAView Profile , H. Rex Hartson Department of Computer Science, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VA Department of Computer Science, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VAView Profile , Deborah Hix Department of Computer Science, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VA Department of Computer Science, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg VAView Profile Authors Info & Claims CHI '94: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing SystemsApril 1994 Pages 159–165https://doi.org/10.1145/191666.191730Online:24 April 1994Publication History 3citation406DownloadsMetricsTotal Citations3Total Downloads406Last 12 Months20Last 6 weeks8 Get Citation AlertsNew Citation Alert added!This alert has been successfully added and will be sent to:You will be notified whenever a record that you have chosen has been cited.To manage your alert preferences, click on the button below.Manage my AlertsNew Citation Alert!Please log in to your account Save to BinderSave to BinderCreate a New BinderNameCancelCreateExport CitationPublisher SiteeReaderPDF