Title: Communicative approach to teaching programming

Authors: Vaclav Vrbik

Addresses: Department of Computing and Instructional Technologies, Faculty of Education, University of West Bohemia, Klatovska 51, Pilsen 306 19, Czech Republic

Abstract: There are many different theoretical researches, which deal with the content and quality of teaching. Their common aim is to improve the quality of teaching both for students and pedagogues. The aim of the paper is to give the basic information about methods of the communicative approach to teaching, in teaching programming. The communicative approach to teaching (CAT) is based on the optimisation of the amount and retention of knowledge, and the character of subject matter achieved by the higher motivation of students|, and applying the knowledge in a real context. The communicative approach to teaching exploits a broad spectrum of methods, which support the general development of instructional ability of students, independent and cooperative solving of problems, and also object teaching. The centre of teaching is created by methods which use mutual communication, together with solving problems in pairs and in groups, and processes elaborating the independent solving of problems. The purpose of this paper is to suggest applying the CAT method mainly used in teaching foreign languages, to teaching programming by means of the Pascal programming language.

Keywords: communicative approach; teaching; computer programming; computing education; communication; Pascal; programming languages.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCEELL.2005.007707

International Journal of Continuing Engineering Education and Life-Long Learning, 2005 Vol.15 No.3/4/5/6, pp.148 - 161

Published online: 03 Sep 2005 *

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