Evaluating the impact of combination of engagement strategies in sep-cyle on improve student learning of programming concepts

Abstract

Programming is a skill, which could be acquired through repeated practice, feedback. In lectures, many students are neither practicing nor obtaining feedback on anything. Practice and feedback would energize the student's motivation, direct their focus on gaining the knowledge. But, from instructor's perspective offering manually quality evaluation for even a smaller class implies that feedback cannot be as instant as one-to-one tutoring. Also, becomes hard as the class size grows. This could be achieved with the help of some supporting tools apart from the lectures, that help in attracting students and motivates them to spend significant time on tasks. SEP-CyLE (Software Engineering and Programming Cyber Learning Environment) is a cyber learning environment that contains digital learning content of software programming and testing concepts. SEP-CyLE incorporates collaborative learning, social networking and gamification strategies that provides students motivation, practice and instant feedback. This paper aims to assess the impact of different combinations of these learning engagement strategies (LESs) of SEP-CyLE on student learning and understanding of programming concepts. We conducted a multi-institution study wherein different combination of LESs were utilized using SEP-CyLE in CS1 classrooms. We analyzed the impact of LESs on students' acquisition of programming concepts, their engagement and usage of SEP-CyLE. The pre and post test results indicated that the assorted LEs have shown a positive impact on student learning across all the institutions. The correlation results demonstrated that there is meaningful relationship between the LEs and the student performance in the course.