The question of which language to use in introductory programming has been cause for protracted debate, often based on emotive opinions. Several studies on the benefits of individual languages or comparisons between two languages have been conducted, but there is still a lack of objective data used to inform these comparisons. This paper presents a list of criteria based on design decisions used by prominent teaching-language creators. The criteria, once justified, are then used to compare eleven languages which are currently used in introductory programming courses. Recommendations are made on how these criteria can be used or adapted for different situations.

Deciding what to teach novice programmers about programming and, in particular, which programming language to teach to novice programmers, and how to teach it, is a common topic for debate within universities. Should an industry relevant programming language be taught, or should a language designed for teaching novices be used? In order to design tools and methodologies for the teaching of novice programmers it is important to uncover what is being taught, and in turn, what will be taught in the future. A census of introductory programming courses administered within all Australian universities has been undertaken. The census aimed to reveal not only what computer programming languages are being taught, but also how they are being taught. From the results of this census two key factors emerged: perceived industry pressure for graduates with certain language skills versus academic training for generic programming skills.

We have applied Simon's system for classifying computing education publications to all three years of papers from ICER. We describe the process of assessing the inter-rater reliability of the system and fine-tuning it along the way. Our analysis of the ICER papers confirms that ICER is a research-intensive conference. It also indicates that the research is quite narrowly focused, with the majority of the papers set in the context of programming courses. In addition we find that ICER has a high proportion of papers involving more than one institution, and high proportions of papers on the themes of ability/aptitude and theories and models of teaching and learning.

Programming is an important skill in computing. This Australasian focussed review compares a number of recent studies that have identified difficulties encountered by novices while learning programming and problem-solving. These studies have show that novices are not performing at expected levels and many novices have only a fragile knowledge of programming, which may prevent them from learning and applying problem solving strategies. The review goes on to explore proposals for explicitly incorporating problem solving strategy instruction into introductory programming curricula and assessment, in attempts to produce improved learning outcomes for novices. Finally, directions suggested by the reviewed studies are gathered and some unanswered questions are raised.

Making the leap from a problem statement to a solution program is a difficult task for novice programmers, even when they may have a sound knowledge of a particular programming language. To bridge this gap students are expected to implicitly build their own strategies through practice exercises. In this paper we argue that a more explicit approach to teaching problem solving strategies may lead to better problem solvers. We suggest a framework that can be used in instruction and assessment of problem solving strategies.