Jinghua Zhang Mustafa Atay Rebecca Caldwell Elva J. Jones

Developing Game-Like Instructional Modules to Enhance Student Learning in Lower Level Core Computer Science Courses

Jinghua Zhang Mustafa Atay Rebecca Caldwell Elva J. Jones Department of Computer ScienceWinston-Salem State University

IntroductionStatistics have shown that fewer African Americans are pursuing Computer Science (CS) degrees relative to their proportion of the overall population and among those who do major in CS very few are employed as programmers. Struggling with the lower level core CS courses is the main barrier preventing students from declaring CS major and retaining students in the program. In this poster, we present our project of developing game-like instructional modules to enhance student learning in those gatekeeper courses namely Computer Programming I, Computer Programming II and Data Structures. The project involves implementing three components as shown in Fig. 1: Education, Assessment and Dissemination. The education component includes developing game-like instructional modules for those three courses, which will allow students to learn the difficult concepts in a gaming context. The assessment component includes establishing an advisory board for the project and implementing the evaluation plan. The advisory board, which consists of experienced CS faculty, education faculty and professionals from the game industry, assists in project development and the evaluation process. The dissemination component includes disseminating results through national conferences, outreach programs, computer science HBCU consortiums, publications and an HBCU faculty workshop. Several modules have been developed and evaluated in the computer programming / Data Structures classes at Winston-Salem State University (WSSU). Initial assessment results show that game-like instructional modules had a positive impact on student learning.

Figure1: Project Components.

Conclusion and Future WorkSeveral modules have been developed and used in the Computer Programming / Data Structures classes. The evaluation results were promising and the feedback from students was very positive. These modules will be refined to incorporate feedback from the students and the advisory board. The evaluation method will be revised to get more accurate assessment of learning gains. The modules are available through our project website (http://compsci.wssu.edu/tip/) for instructors and students at other institutions.

AcknowledgementThis work was supported by NSF HRD-1137548. Many thanks go to Computer Science Game Development Group at WSSU for their contributions to this project.

Student Comments

The primary objectives of the evaluation plan are to measure the effect of the game-like instructional modules on student learning in lower-level core CS courses and to determine the quality and effectiveness of this project in regards to enhancing computer science education. Surveys have been developed for each module based on a comprehensive review of the literature addressing issues on learning. Respondents were asked to comment on the course modules with respect to content, techniques and effectiveness. The pre-test and post-test were developed and distributed for each targeted concept. The feedback were reviewed by the advisory board, faculty and students. The instructional modules will be revised. Revisions to the surveys, pre-test and post-test will be made as needed.

All the modules have been used in Computer Programming or Data Structures classes since Fall 2011. Students took the pre-test, played the game and then took the post-test and the survey. The pre-test and post-test were very similar. The test results were compared to assess learning gains. The survey and student feedback were examined as well.

Evaluation

• “The game was very enjoyable. I did not even feel like I was doing work. It made learning easier.”

• “The game was fun and improved my skills.”• “I learned more about loops and I can interact with what I’m

doing. It gave me a visual understanding. ” • “Thank you for this experience. It really has me excited to become

a video game programmer. I learned a good amount from this game.”

Project ImplementationThe project team identifies topics that our students struggle with most in the lower level core CS courses and develops game-like instructional modules to enhance students’ understanding of the difficult concepts. Each game-like instructional module will follow a similar implementation process as shown in the Fig. 2.

Several course modules have been developed by the CS game development group at WSSU and used in the classroom. These modules were developed using GameMaker.

• Iterative Dungeon: This module was designed to help students visualize the for loop. Fig. 3 shows the visualization steps of a nested for loop.

• Garden Gnomes: This module was designed to help students visualize the process of iterating through an array using for loops. Fig. 4 shows how to access the elements in 2D arrays.

• Recursion: This module was designed to help students learn and practice how to use recursion to find the numbers in the Fibonacci sequence and how to calculate the Factorial of a natural number using recursion step by step in the game. Fig. 5 shows screenshots of the game.

• Linked List: This module was designed to help student learn and practice the basic operations (Inserting a new node, Inserting a new node to a specified position on the list, deleting a node and searching for a node) on Linked List in a fun game. Fig. 6 shows screenshots of the game.

Figure 4. Accessing the elements in 2D arrays

Figure 3.Iterative Dungeon: Visualizing a nested for loop execution.

StartBrainstorm the

game ideas for the targeted topic

Produce the storyboard for

the game

Implement the prototype

Present the prototype to the advisory board

Refine the prototype and finalize the game

Use the module in the classroom

Refine the module based on student feedback

Finish

Figure 2. a Game-like Instructional Module Implementation Process. Figure 5. Recursion

Figure 6. Linked List