Exploring Instructional Support Design in an Educational Game for K-12 Computing Education

Zhi, Rui; Lytle, Nicholas; Price, Thomas W.

doi:10.1145/3159450.3159519

Cited by 16 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…They conclude that although examples and annotations help novice programmers to perform better in programming tasks, the support is not enough. Zhi et al (2018) designed BOTS, a serious game about programming to compare the in-game performance of participants in puzzle completion time and solution code length, for three kinds of support: instructional text, worked examples, and erroneous worked examples. In their study, 6-12th grade students used a LOGO-like environment to control a robot with movement commands, conditions, loops, and functions.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Particularly in programming, worked examples is an important pedagogic strategy, as it promotes schemata construction by managing cognitive load during problem-solving (Chi et al, 1989). Most of the studies in the field conclude that further research is needed to find alternative support designs to improve learning effectiveness (Andersen et al, 2012; Spieler et al, 2020; Zhi et al, 2018). The paper proposes a variant of worked examples, where they are placed in-game and provide immediate feedback on how instructions are used.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ingame Worked Examples Support as an Alternative to Textual Instructions in Serious Games About Programming

Toukiloglou

Xinogalos

2022

Journal of Educational Computing Research

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Serious games are considered an effective method to engage students in programming education and have been increasingly used in classrooms. An important part of the learning process with serious games involves the presentation of the new concepts and the provided support to encounter student difficulties. Although the most common approach is the use of instructional text, it comes with some drawbacks. This paper proposes an alternative method for user support in serious games about programming which mitigates current problems and provides improved learning efficiency. An experiment was conducted (N = 291) to test textual instructions learning efficiency compared to in-game worked examples. Two randomly assigned groups used different types of support in a block-based game, developed for the study. Our implementation provided support through a non-player character who executed worked examples inside the game world. The analysis showed a significant statistical difference in score performance between the two supports on both novice and experienced students. The results point to increased learning efficiency by students, when in-game worked examples and problem solving are combined. We further argue that the Cognitive Load Theory can provide adequate justification for the outcomes.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ingame Worked Examples Support as an Alternative to Textual Instructions in Serious Games About Programming

Toukiloglou

Xinogalos

2022

Journal of Educational Computing Research

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“…Zhi et al [15] investigated the design of instructional support in an educational programming game, BOTS, aimed at teaching secondary school students. The instructional support provided within BOTS consists of three different strategies, namely, instructional text, worked examples, and erroneous worked examples (i.e., buggy code).…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Game-Based Learning: Enhancing Student Experience, Knowledge Gain, and Usability in Higher Education Programming Courses

et al. 2022

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This article presents a large-scale study which investigates students' reaction to game-based learning as part of programming courses. The study focuses on knowledge acquisition, learner experience, and game usability.Background: Despite the rapid growth of the information and communication technologies (ICTs) sector, the lack of engagement with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) subjects and high dropout rates in computer science and engineering majors is linked directly to the large number of unfilled vacancies in the ICT employment market. To tackle one of the underlying causes for this crisis, (i.e., traditional teaching paradigms struggle to attract students to rather abstract and difficult STEM subjects such as programming), innovative technology-enhanced learning solutions are sought.Intended Outcomes: A set of serious games were proposed and designed to promote students' understanding of programming concepts, improve their confidence, stimulate their interest in STEM and increase engagement with the courses through vivid and appealing scenarios.Application Design: Targeting undergraduate and postgraduate students, the games focused on several key programming topics. They were designed to visualize the programming concepts in illustrative and entertaining scenarios. A comprehensive assessment methodology which includes surveys, observations, and interviews was employed to investigate the impact of the games.Findings: The results show that by using the games in the teaching and learning process all the students have benefited, although differently based on their location, educational backgrounds, and game played. The impact of detailed demographic aspects, such as participants' use of technology, their initial Manuscript

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“…Thus, two instructional approaches (in the form of supplementary documents) are promising to help them to work with blocks and solve programming problems, namely worked examples and instructional procedures. Worked examples have been introduced as a common support to teach learners how to solve programming and mathematical issues by presenting a solution [ZLP18,MGG + 14]. A large number of empirical studies demonstrate beneficial effects of worked examples, for an overview see for example [ADRW00, SVMP98, SKR + 10].…”

Section: Chapter 1 Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, although instructional procedures are widespread used, they often do not support learning optimally [WR08, MGG + 14]. Zhi et al [ZLP18] used text-based instructional procedures in a puzzle-based educational programming game called BOTS [HCB14] to solve programming problems. In this learning context, they found that presenting instructional procedures of the solution was less effective for learning than worked examples.…”

Section: Chapter 1 Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impacts of Block-based Programming on Young Learners' Programming Skills and Attitudes in the Context of Smart Environments

Seraj

2020

Proceedings of the 2020 ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education

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Programming difficulties Lack of Syntactic Knowledge Lack of Conceptual Knowledge Lack of Strategic Knowledge Topics interesting Smart Environments Mobile Robots Tangible Artifacts Block-based Programming Tangible and Smart Objects and Environments Design and Development of Block-based Programming Tool Encourage them to begin with programming activities Improving their attitudes towards programming and computer science Fostering their programming performance (acquisition of basic programming skills)

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Exploring Instructional Support Design in an Educational Game for K-12 Computing Education

Cited by 16 publications

References 13 publications

Ingame Worked Examples Support as an Alternative to Textual Instructions in Serious Games About Programming

Ingame Worked Examples Support as an Alternative to Textual Instructions in Serious Games About Programming

Game-Based Learning: Enhancing Student Experience, Knowledge Gain, and Usability in Higher Education Programming Courses

Impacts of Block-based Programming on Young Learners' Programming Skills and Attitudes in the Context of Smart Environments

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