{"474101":{"#nid":"474101","#data":{"type":"event","title":"PhD Proposal by Barbara J. Ericson","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003ETitle:\u0026nbsp;\u003Cstrong\u003EEVALUATING THE EFFECTIVINESS AND EFFICIENCY OF\u0026nbsp;PARSONS PROBLEMS AND DYNAMICALLY ADAPTIVE\u0026nbsp;PARSONS PROBLEMS AS A TYPE OF LOW COGNITIVE LOAD\u0026nbsp;PRACTICE PROBLEM\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBarbara J. Ericson\u003Cbr \/\u003E Ph.D. student\u003Cbr \/\u003E Human Centered Computing\u003Cbr \/\u003E College of Computing\u003Cbr \/\u003E Georgia Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDate: Wednesday, December 9, 2015\u003Cbr \/\u003E Time: 12pm to 2pm EDT\u003Cbr \/\u003E \u003Cstrong\u003ELocation: TSRB 223\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ECommittee\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2013\u003Cbr \/\u003E Dr. James Foley, School of Interactive Computing (advisor)\u003Cbr \/\u003E Dr. Amy Bruckman, School of Interactive Computing\u003Cbr \/\u003E Dr. Ashok Goel, School of Interactive Computing\u003Cbr \/\u003E Dr. Richard Catrambone, School of Psychology\u003Cbr \/\u003E Dr. Mitchel Resnick, Media Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EAbstract\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2013\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ELearning to program can be difficult and can result in hours of frustration looking\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Efor syntactic or semantic errors. This can make it especially difficult to prepare inservice\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E(working) high school teachers who don\u2019t have any prior programming\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eexperience to teach programming, since it requires an unpredictable amount of time for\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Epractice in order to learn programming. The United States is trying to prepare 10,000\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ehigh school teachers to teach introductory programming courses by fall 2016. Most\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eintroductory programming courses and textbooks rely on having learners gain experience\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eby writing lots of programs. However, writing programs is a complex cognitive task,\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ewhich can easily overload working memory, which impedes learning.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOne way to potentially decrease the cognitive load of learning to program is to\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Euse Parsons problems to give teachers practice with syntactic and semantic errors as well\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eas exposure to common algorithms. Parsons problems are a type of low cognitive load\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ecode completion problem in which the correct code is provided, but is mixed up and has\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eto be placed in the correct order. Some variants of Parsons problems also require the\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ecode to be indented to show the block structure. Distractor code can also be provided\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ethat contains syntactic and semantic errors.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn my research I will compare solving Parsons problems that contain syntactic and\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Esemantic errors, to fixing code with the same syntactic and semantic errors, and to writing\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ethe equivalent code. I will examine learning from pre- to post-test as well as student\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ereported cognitive load. In addition, I will create dynamically adaptive Parsons problems\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ewhere the difficulty level of the problem is based on the learners\u2019 prior and current\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eprogress. If the learner solves one Parsons problem in one attempt the next problem will\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ebe made more difficult. If the learner is having trouble solving a Parsons problem the\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ecurrent problem will be made easier. This should\u0026nbsp;enhance learning by keeping the\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eproblem in the learner\u2019s zone of proximal development as described by Vygotsky. I will\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Ecompare non-adaptive Parsons problems to dynamically adaptive Parsons problems in\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eterms of enjoyment, completion, learning, and cognitive load.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe major contributions of this work are a better understanding of how variants of\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EParsons problems can be used to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of learning to\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eprogram and how they relate to code fixing and code writing. Parsons problems can help\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eteachers practice programming in order to prepare them to teach introductory computer\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Escience at the high school level and potentially help reduce the frustration and difficulty\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003Eall beginning programmers face in learning to program.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E \u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":"","field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"EVALUATING THE EFFECTIVINESS AND EFFICIENCY OF PARSONS PROBLEMS AND DYNAMICALLY ADAPTIVE PARSONS PROBLEMS AS A TYPE OF LOW COGNITIVE LOAD PRACTICE PROBLEM"}],"uid":"27707","created_gmt":"2015-11-30 15:16:12","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 02:15:01","author":"Tatianna Richardson","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","field_event_time":{"event_time_start":"2015-12-09T16:00:00-05:00","event_time_end":"2015-12-09T18:00:00-05:00","event_time_end_last":"2015-12-09T18:00:00-05:00","gmt_time_start":"2015-12-09 21:00:00","gmt_time_end":"2015-12-09 23:00:00","gmt_time_end_last":"2015-12-09 23:00:00","rrule":null,"timezone":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"groups":[{"id":"221981","name":"Graduate Studies"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[{"id":"102851","name":"Phd proposal"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[{"id":"1788","name":"Other\/Miscellaneous"}],"invited_audience":[{"id":"78771","name":"Public"}],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}