Learning to Program with Alice Animation in Virtual Worlds Steve Cooper scoopersju'edu

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Learning to Program with AliceAnimation in
Virtual WorldsSteve Cooper scooper_at_sju.edu

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Research Group

• Stephen Cooper, Saint Joseph's University
• Wanda Dann, Ithaca College
• Randy Pausch and Alice team at Carnegie Mellon
  University
• National Science Foundation grants (CCLI, ATE)

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Talk Overview

• Why Alice?
• Dealing with Facts
• Approach with Alice
• Effectiveness
• Demonstration and Hands-on "How To"
• Use the Alice interface
• Program with Alice

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Dealing with the Facts

• OOP in introductory programming courses
• Fundamental concepts still needed
• Sequence, decision-making, repetition, functions,
  parameters
• OOP concepts now added
• Classes, objects, methods, inheritance
• The time available in a semester has not
  changed but the conceptual complexity has
  increased

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Other Issues

• Decreasing enrollment in CS CIS programs
  nationwide
• Reported at 23-29 each of last two years
• Dropout rate in first year
• Typically 30 50
• Percentage of women has decreased dramatically

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The Alice Approach

• A blend of
• Traditional problem solving techniques
• Storyboards
• borrowed from animation film industry
• Program visualization
• High impact motivation
• 3D graphics
• animation
• Goals
• Decrease attrition
• Attract more majors, including women
• Maintain interest motivation

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Effectiveness Study

• Retention in CS1
• Treatment Group at risk 88
• Control Group at risk 47
• Control Group low Risk 75
• (P lt .05, c2)
• We saw approximately a 1 point (GPA)
• Improvement in grades in CS1

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Support materials

• Textbook
• http//vig.prenhall.com8081/catalog/academic/prod
  uct/0,1144,0131424203,00.html
• Support materials
• http//www.sju.edu/scooper/alice/course/alice.htm
  l
• Alice Software
• http//www.alice.org/

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Schools using Alice

• Bucknell University
• California Lutheran University
• California State University at Humboldt
• Camden County College
• Carnegie Mellon University
• Clemson University
• Colorado School of Mines
• Community College of Philadelphia
• Cornell University
• Duke University
• Georgetown College
• Haverford College
• Ithaca College
• Manor College

• Mississippi Valley State University
• Plymouth State University
• Saint Edwards University
• Saint Joseph's University
• Saint Lawrence College
• San Diego State University
• Sierra Nevada College
• Southwestern University
• Tompkins Cortland Community College
• University of Colorado
• University of Illinois
• University of Mississippi
• Virginia Polytechnic Institute
• And several high schools

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Demonstration and hands-on how-to

• Problem statement
• Design
• Implement
• Test

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Creating a program

• Problem statement (animation scenario)
• After traveling through space, a robot-manned
  craft has just made a breathless landing on the
  surface of a moon. The robot has already climbed
  out of the lunar Lander and has set up a camera
  so earthbound scientists at the NASA center in
  Houston can view this historic event. Through the
  camera (the scene in our world), we can see the
  robot, the lunar Lander and some nearby rock
  formations. Suddenly an alien peeks out from
  behind a rock and looks at the robot. The robot
  is surprised and rotates its head all the way
  around. The robot walks over to take a closer
  look and the alien hides behind the rocks.
  Finally, the robot looks at the camera, signals
  danger, and says "Houston, we have a
  problem!"

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Design

• To create a design, we borrow the idea of
  storyboards from professional animators at
  Disney, Pixar, etc.

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Visual Storyboards
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Textual Storyboard
Do the following steps in order alien moves
up alien says "Slithy toves?" robot's
head turns around robot turns to look at
alien Do together robot moves
toward the alien robot legs walk
alien moves down robot's head turns to
look at the camera robot's head turns red
(to signal a problem) robot says "Houston,
we have a problem!"

Start with a visual storyboard and then develop
the textual storyboard to provide pseudocode -- a
detailed "to do list".
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Implementation

• Idea
• For the first program, demonstrate translating
  the storyboard into program code
• Demo

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Where to go for more information

• Alice summer workshops
• University of Mississippi (May 23-24)
• Duke University (June 11-12)
• Haverford College (June 21-22)
• Register (deadline is today!) at
• http//www.sju.edu/scooper/alice/workshop.html
• Workshops at CCP
• Contact Chuck Herbert