Enhancing Teaching & Learning of Software Engineering in an International Environment

A fundamental artifact of any academic research isthe data used as the basis of that research effort. A group ofresearchers, from institutions in multiple territories, hasembarked on an ambitious research project that is initially aimedat enhancing the teaching of software engineering for four-yearundergraduate programs. The research project details a set ofworkshops, for which the objective is the capture of data that willbe the basis of the research effort. The first of these workshopswas held in August of 2011, and is reported on in this paper. Theworkshop comprised software engineering educators andrepresentatives from the information technology industry. Thedata collection task sought to identify a set of topics that areconsidered suitable for teaching software engineering, along withidentification of the years and depth at which these topics shouldbe taught. The use of technology in the curriculum design processis seen as an important step forward and this issue is alsodiscussed

Monitor Newsletter April 16, 1990

Official Publication of Bowling Green State University for Faculty and Staffhttps://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/monitor/2011/thumbnail.jp

Benchmark Portfolio for SOFT 261: Software Engineering IV

This benchmark portfolio documents the course objectives, teaching strategies, and assessments for the inaugural offering of SOFT 261: Software Engineering IV at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL). This is the final course in the core sequence of software engineering courses taken by students in the new undergraduate program in software engineering at UNL. These courses teach fundamental computer science concepts in the broader context of engineering software. As an ACE (Achievement-Centered Education) 2 course, the instructional material in SOFT 261 is focused on teaching visual communications skills in the context of applying software engineering processes to a real-world software project. This portfolio describes the course objectives and how this course fits into the broader context of software engineering education at UNL. It also describes the instructional strategies used to teach visual communications embedded in a software engineering course and the assessments used to evaluate student learning. This portfolio also analyzes student learning to assess the effectiveness of the teaching strategies and course materials. Finally, this portfolio reflects on the intellectual challenges of designing and teaching a visual communications course specifically for software engineering majors that incorporates team-based, hands-on learning working with and communicating with software developers on a large open-source project

Propuesta de herramientas pedagógicas experienciales para la enseñanza de simulación discreta empleando la metodología aplicada por el Grupo GEIO

El siguiente trabajo presenta un estudio realizado desde el grupo GEIO adscrito a la Facultad de Ingeniería Industrial de la Universidad Tecnológica de Pereira, donde se generó una propuesta que consiste en utilizar una serie de herramientas pedagógicas para la enseñanza de la simulación discreta mediante la metodología del grupo de investigación. Para el desarrollo del proyecto, primero, se identificaron diferentes herramientas planteadas en contextos universitarios, para la enseñanza de las temáticas de investigación de operaciones y estadística empleando elementos computacionales, luego se analizaron algunas unidades temáticas desarrolladas por centros educativos de la región; más adelante se identificaron cuáles de los experimentos pedagógicos y lúdicos desarrollados por el grupo GEIO podrían emplearse para facilitar el aprendizaje de temáticas de investigación de operaciones y estadística empleando herramientas computacionales, de esta forma, se adaptaron los mismo para que pudieran ser utilizados para apoyar el proceso de enseñanza de simulación discreta. El resultado final de la investigación fue la generación de una cartilla educativa donde se compilaron las herramientas lúdicas desarrolladas; de esta forma se creó una propuesta pedagógica que puede ser empleada por docentes y orientadores para la creación de entornos educativos caracterizados por la presencia de escenarios lúdicos de sistemas productivos, donde los participantes y/o estudiantes pueden reconocer y modificar variables del mismo sin incurrir en riesgos para ellos u otros, así recopilar todo el conocimiento vivenciado durante la exploración de la lúdica para desarrollar un modelo de simulación discreta del experimento ejecutado

An investigation into the learnability of object-oriented case tools for computing education

The use of Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tools for teaching object-oriented systems analysis and design (OOSAD) has many potential benefits, but there are also several problems associated with the usage of these tools. A large portion of these problems relate to the usability and learnability of these tools. Learnability is one of the most important attributes of usability and refers to the capability of the system to enable the user to learn its application. The main research question that this study aims to address is “How can the learnability of OO CASE tools for computing education in South Africa be evaluated?”. In order to answer this question several frameworks for evaluating CASE tool usability and learnability were investigated. One of these frameworks, as proposed by Senapathi, was selected as being the most appropriate for evaluating CASE tool learnability for computing education. This framework maintains that the learnability of a CASE tool is dependent on context of use factors such as the tool used, as well as user characteristics such as gender. The primary aim of this research was thus to validate Senapathi's framework for CASE tool learnability in a South African context. A secondary aim of the research was to extend the implementation of the framework in order to enable the comparison of two CASE tools and to support the inclusion of other user characteristics. An experiment was performed at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) in 2006. The participants recruited for this experiment were second year computing students at NMMU. During this experiment, the learnability of two OO CASE tools, namely IBM's Rational Software Modeller and Microsoft's Visio, was evaluated and compared. The quantitative and qualitative results supported Senapathi's results and showed that her framework could be used to evaluate CASE tool learnability and could be adapted to evaluate two CASE tools. The results also showed that the majority of the participants rated the learnability of Microsoft Visio higher for both tasks and that the main reasons participants preferred Visio was due to its simplicity, familiarity and recoverability

¿Cómo diseñan software los estudiantes de grado? Una revisión sistemática de la literatura

El diseño de software es un proceso creativo y fundamental para construir software de calidad. Realizar un diseño de software no es una tarea simple, no hay una única solución a un problema de diseño y son necesarios diferentes conocimientos sobre programación, diseño y otras habilidades para desarrollar un diseño de calidad. A nivel educativo, el diseño es una disciplina compleja de entender para los estudiantes universitarios, y el éxito (es decir, construir un buen diseño) parece requerir un cierto nivel de desarrollo cognitivo que pocos estudiantes logran. Este trabajo realizado pretende contribuir al conocimiento existente sobre la enseñanza y el aprendizaje del diseño de software por parte de estudiantes de grado o próximos a recibirse. A partir de una Revisión Sistemática de la Literatura (SLR) se busca conocer cómo diseñan software los estudiantes de grado y los problemas o dificultades con los que se encuentran tanto a nivel de formación como de concepto al estudiar o realizar un diseño de software. La revisión sistemática realizada describe el motivo de la revisión, las preguntas de investigación, la estrategia de búsqueda, los criterios de inclusión/exclusión, la extracción y síntesis de los datos y los resultados utilizando la forma de presentar revisiones sistemáticas propuestas por Kitchenham and Charters (2007) y Kitchenham et al. (2015). Además, se elabora un protocolo de trabajo que fue utilizado en la ejecución de un piloto inicial con el propósito de validarlo, ajustarlo y mejorarlo. El protocolo final elaborado sirve cómo insumo para futuras investigaciones que busquen obtener nuevos resultados. Como resultado de la SLR se seleccionaron 14 estudios que responden a la pregunta “¿cómo diseñan software los estudiantes de grado?”. Estos 14 estudios identifican diferentes tipos de investigación, siendo casos de estudio (case study) y “experimento” los principales tipos de investigación encontrados. Las técnicas más utilizadas por los estudiantes al realizar un diseño de software en estos estudios son patrones de diseño, diagramas de clase, de secuencia y de objeto. Estos estudios identifican numerosos problemas que tienen los estudiantes al diseñar software, entre ellos, la falta de experiencia, la falta de análisis de los requisitos, la forma en que se dictan y formulan los cursos de diseño, la falta vi de material y la complejidad que tiene el enseñar y aprender diseño.Software design is a creative and fundamental process to build quality software. Produce software design isn´t a simple task: there is no a single solution to a design problem and different knowledge about programming, design and other skills are needed to develop quality software. At educational level, design is a complex discipline for university students to understand, and its success (that is, to build a good design) seems require certain level of cognitive development that few students achieve. This work pretends to contribute to the existing knowledge about teaching and learning software design by undergraduate students or next to be received. From a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) we seek to know how undergraduate students design software and the problems or difficulties they find at training, studying or building a software design. The systematic review describes the reason for the review, the research questions, the search strategy, the inclusion/exclusion criteria, the data extraction and synthesis, and the results using the method of systematic reviews proposed by Kitchenham and Charters (2007) and Kitchenham et al. (2015). In addition, a work protocol is elaborate that was used in the execution of an initial pilot with the purpose of validating, adjusting and improving it. The final protocol produced serves as an input for future research that seek to find new results. As a result of the SLR, 14 studies were selected that respond the research question “how do undergraduate students design software?”. These 14 studies identify different kinds of research, and the main kinds of research found have been study cases and “experiment”. The techniques most used by students when doing a software design in these studies are design patterns, class diagrams, sequence diagrams and object diagrams. This studies identify many problems students have when designing software, including lack of experience, lack of requirements analysis, the way software design courses are taught and formulated, the lack of material and the complexity of teaching and learning design

Evaluation of the SEPA in Teaching Undergraduate Software Engineering in the Traditional Computer Science Curriculum

Experiences provide computer science majors need to mirror the typical situation a student will encounter after graduation. The frustration as well as the benefit of working in a group can only be appreciated if experienced first hand. This has made the introduction of software engineering concepts into the traditional computer science curriculum an invaluable component in all computer science courses. The use of Software Engineering - A Practitioner\u27s Approach (SEPA) in an undergraduate software engineering course taught at Montclair in the Spring of 1997 was an attempt to expose the students to situations as typical of real-world conditions as possible. In assessing the impact of this approach on undergraduate software education, I concluded that the SEPA can provide a rich and significantly worthwhile experience for students as the students in this course had very positive feedback regarding the course