Research in Computer Science Education - Guide to Teaching Computer Science: An Activity-Based Approach - page 64

Activity 28 which deals with learners' misconceptions naturally its for the MTCS
course. A similar activity, however, can be facilitated in any computer science class
since it is expected that any computer scientist be familiar with common mistakes.
In both cases, the computer science subject on which the activity is based can be
changed according to the context in which the activity is facilitated.
Further, the analysis of correct and incorrect solutions can promote the understand-
ing of any computer science concept. Such an analysis can be carried out in two
stages:
a. Classification of given (both correct and incorrect) solutions for a given problem
b. Discussion of the correct and the incorrect solutions: with respect to correct solu-
tions, to find their uniqueness; with respect to incorrect solutions, to discuss what
is wrong and to correct them
Activity 28: The Teacher as a Researcher
The target of this activity is to give the prospective computer science teach-
ers an opportunity to identify learners' misconceptions. This activity, which
gives the prospective teachers a simple context to investigate and examine
the source of learners' mistakes, can be viewed as a first experience in adapt-
ing a researcher's point of view. Such an experience may enable them in the
future to help their students repair their own conceptions and improve their
understanding.
The students receive a set of solutions for a given problem that addresses
a basic use of one-dimensional arrays. First, they are asked to solve the ques-
tion by themselves. Second, they should identify correct and incorrect solu-
tions from a given collection of solutions. Third, for each of the incorrect
solutions they should suggest a possible source for the incorrect answer, i.e.,
to speculate what the learner who presented the said solution does not under-
stand or (even better) does not understand well. Later, they are asked to sug-
gest additional examples for incorrect solutions for problems that result from
misconceptions they assume learners may have. Finally, several reflective
activities take place.
Overall, the activity includes six parts and is based on individual work,
work in pairs and class discussion. As can be observed, it addresses several
pedagogical aspects and topics, such as, alternative conceptions (see Chap. 6),
reflection (see Chap. 5), constructivism (see Chap. 2), and different types of
questions (see Chap. 9).
• Stage A: Solving a problem, individual work
Each student is given a worksheet with the problem (see Table 4.2 ) and is
asked to solve it and to keep all the drafts. In addition, the students are asked
to present a list of computer science concepts that in their opinion are mani-
fested in this question.