What do students learn about programming from game, music video, and storytelling projects?

Authors:
Joel C. Adams;Andrew R. Webster
Affiliations:
Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI, USA;Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI, USA
Venue:
Proceedings of the 43rd ACM technical symposium on Computer Science Education
Year:
2012

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Abstract

Drag-and-drop learning environments like Alice (alice.org) and Scratch (scratch.mit.edu) eliminate syntax errors, making them attractive as ways to introduce programming concepts to students. Alice is closely associated with storytelling, Scratch was designed for creating music videos, and both can be used to create games. Having had students create each kind of project, we began to wonder: Do students learn different things creating games compared to music videos or stories? What programming constructs do students actually use (and hence learn well enough to be able to apply)? To answer these questions, we conducted a quantitative analysis of a collection of over 300 different student projects created using these tools. In examining different kinds of projects, we found significant differences in how frequently the students creating those projects used variables, if statements, loops, and dialog constructs.