Fill-in-the-blank Questions for Object-Oriented Programming Education and Its Preliminary Evaluation

Miyuki Murata; Naoko Kato; Mika Ohtsuki; Tetsuro Kakeshita

doi:10.52731/ijltle.v6.i1.699

Miyuki Murata National Institute of Technology, Kumamoto Collage
Naoko Kato National Institute of Technology, Ariake College
Mika Ohtsuki Saga University
Tetsuro Kakeshita Saga University

DOI: https://doi.org/10.52731/ijltle.v6.i1.699

Keywords: Learning Analytics, programming education, object-oriented programming, Java, fill-in-the-blank question

Abstract

Object-oriented technology is important to improve software quality from various perspectives. We have developed pgtracer, a programming education tool that pro-vides fill-in-the-blank questions for the C programming language. By analyzing the data collected by using pgtracer in actual classes, we have obtained useful knowledge for C programming education. In this paper, we develop fill-in-the-blank questions for Java programs to extend pgtracer for object-oriented programming. The fill-in-the-blank question consists of a set of programs and trace tables. A program and a trace table respectively correspond to a Java class and an instance. A trace ta-ble contains message sendings between instances, which are important for under-standing the behavior of object-oriented programs. Furthermore, we introduce blanks that students do not need to fill. This provides more flexibility in setting the difficulty level while reducing the student workload to fill the blanks. We report the results of a trial experiment in which students were asked to solve some of the fill-in-the-blank questions using the Embedded Answers (Cloze) question type of Moodle's Questions function. Analysis of the collected student data will provide useful knowledge for object-oriented programming education, which will be reported in a future report.

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