Hi. I have been casually watching this discussion but feel that my recently completed thesis might be of interest to some particularly those thinking of mental models and conceptions of a program.
As I am not in an academic position at present, I am not able to take my work to what I see as the next stage. However, a key premise is that how a person perceives the task or the outcome of the task influences the way that they approach that task and the resulting outcome. This is view is based on Ramsden's work (2003). What my thesis does is explore the practitioner perceptions of an object-oriented program. I believe that it has valuable information that should be considered in debates about teaching programming. Thesis is: Thompson, E. (2008). How do they understand? Practitioner perceptions of an object-oriented program. Dissertation, Massey University, Palmerston North. URL: http://www.teach.thompsonz.net/img/Thompson2008PhDThesis.pdf Errol Thompson KiwiET Computing Consultancy and Computing Education Research 2 Haven Grove Naenae Lower Hutt. E-mail: kiwiet (at) acm.org kiwiet (at) computer.org Windows Live: kiwiet (at) computer.org Skype: kiwielt Phone +64 21 2101662 Blog: http://kiwi-et.blogspot.com/ Website: http://www.teach.thompsonz.net/
