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The importance of students' attention to program state: a case study of debugging behavior

Author:

Colleen M. LewisAuthors Info & Claims

ICER '12: Proceedings of the ninth annual international conference on International computing education research

Pages 127 - 134

https://doi.org/10.1145/2361276.2361301

Published: 09 September 2012 Publication History

Abstract

To develop a model of students' debugging processes, I conducted a qualitative analysis of young students engaged in debugging computer programs they had written in the programming language Scratch. I present a microgenetic analysis that tracks how one student's attention to elements of computer program state shifted during his debugging process. I present evidence that this student had relevant domain knowledge and claim that his changing attention within the problem, and not his domain knowledge, mediated his debugging process. I hypothesize that a key competence in debugging is learning to identify what elements of program state are important to pay attention to and that this attention, and not only domain knowledge, mediates the debugging process. This hypothesis is consistent with a model of physics reasoning and learning from the Knowledge in Pieces theoretical framework and in this research I build upon education research outside of computer science. The case study analyzes the debugging process of a student entering the sixth grade, but I document an isomorphic case from a pair of college students to show that this pattern extends beyond this age.

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Cited By

Sruthi PGuo ZChu DChen ZZhang Y(2024)Demystifying the Fight Against Complexity: A Comprehensive Study of Live Debugging Activities in Production Cloud SystemsProceedings of the 2024 ACM Symposium on Cloud Computing10.1145/3698038.3698568(341-360)Online publication date: 20-Nov-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3698038.3698568
DeLiema DBye JMarupudi V(2024)Debugging Pathways: Open-Ended Discrepancy Noticing, Causal Reasoning, and InterveningACM Transactions on Computing Education10.1145/365011524:2(1-34)Online publication date: 10-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3650115
Brown NGuzdial MStephenson BStone JBattestilli LRebelsky SShoop L(2024)Confidence vs Insight: Big and Rich Data in Computing Education ResearchProceedings of the 55th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3626252.3630813(158-164)Online publication date: 7-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3626252.3630813
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

The importance of students' attention to program state: a case study of debugging behavior
1. Applied computing
  1. Education
2. Social and professional topics
  1. Professional topics
    1. Computing education

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Published In

cover image ACM Conferences

ICER '12: Proceedings of the ninth annual international conference on International computing education research

September 2012

174 pages

ISBN:9781450316040

DOI:10.1145/2361276

General Chairs:
Alison Clear
CPIT, Christchurch, NZ
,
Kate Sanders
Rhode Island College, Providence, USA
,
Beth Simon
USD, San Diego, USA

Copyright © 2012 ACM.

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SIGCSE: ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education

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Published: 09 September 2012

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ICER '12: International Computing Education Research Conference

September 9 - 11, 2012

Auckland, New Zealand

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Overall Acceptance Rate 189 of 803 submissions, 24%

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Cited By

Sruthi PGuo ZChu DChen ZZhang Y(2024)Demystifying the Fight Against Complexity: A Comprehensive Study of Live Debugging Activities in Production Cloud SystemsProceedings of the 2024 ACM Symposium on Cloud Computing10.1145/3698038.3698568(341-360)Online publication date: 20-Nov-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3698038.3698568
DeLiema DBye JMarupudi V(2024)Debugging Pathways: Open-Ended Discrepancy Noticing, Causal Reasoning, and InterveningACM Transactions on Computing Education10.1145/365011524:2(1-34)Online publication date: 10-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3650115
Brown NGuzdial MStephenson BStone JBattestilli LRebelsky SShoop L(2024)Confidence vs Insight: Big and Rich Data in Computing Education ResearchProceedings of the 55th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3626252.3630813(158-164)Online publication date: 7-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3626252.3630813
Alqadi B(2024)Enhancing Novice Programmers’ Debugging Skills Through Systematic Education: A Comparative StudyIEEE Access10.1109/ACCESS.2024.350964112(181192-181204)Online publication date: 2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2024.3509641
Jayathirtha GFields DKafai Y(2024)Distributed debugging with electronic textiles: understanding high school student pairs’ problem-solving strategies, practices, and perspectives on repairing physical computing projectsComputer Science Education10.1080/08993408.2023.229773834:4(718-752)Online publication date: 21-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.1080/08993408.2023.2297738
Pankiewicz MZambrano ABarany ABaker R(2024)How We Code Code: Leveraging GPT and Ordered Networks for Understanding Introductory Programming EducationAdvances in Quantitative Ethnography10.1007/978-3-031-76332-8_19(225-240)Online publication date: 2-Nov-2024
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-76332-8_19
Xie BLim JPham PLi MKo A(2023)Developing Novice Programmers’ Self-Regulation Skills with Code ReplaysProceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research - Volume 110.1145/3568813.3600127(298-313)Online publication date: 7-Aug-2023
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Lewis C(2023)Examples of Unsuccessful Use of Code Comprehension Strategies: A Resource for Developing Code Comprehension PedagogyProceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research - Volume 110.1145/3568813.3600116(15-28)Online publication date: 7-Aug-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3568813.3600116
Nelson-Fromm T(2023)Open-Ended Assignments for Teaching Contextualized ComputingProceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research - Volume 210.1145/3568812.3603445(76-78)Online publication date: 7-Aug-2023
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Theobold AWickstrom MHancock S(2023)Coding Code: Qualitative Methods for Investigating Data Science SkillsJournal of Statistics and Data Science Education10.1080/26939169.2023.227784732:2(161-173)Online publication date: 28-Dec-2023
https://doi.org/10.1080/26939169.2023.2277847
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