“Mmm… Donuts!” Using Real-World Scenarios in a First-Year Programming Course
John K. Estell, Stephany Coffman-Wolph, Ian Kropp · 2024
This complete, evidence-based practice paper describes experiential work involving the application of the entrepreneurial mindset in the first computer programming course (CS1).Teaching CS1 has always been challenging, with first-year students trying to learn problemsolving design methodologies expressed in a "foreign" language.When materials are presented abstractly -i.e., emphasizing computing for its own sake -the result is often a disconnect: our students cannot envision how the concepts being taught can be meaningfully applied to real-world situations.Consequently, it is important for CS1 instructors to provide appropriate context allowing students to make connections between their coursework and providing value to others through their coding.The approach presented here involves creating programming assignments featuring real-world scenarios -something that could be encountered in an everyday activity.To illustrate this approach, this paper will frame a typical CS1 problem -calculating the price of a business transaction and subsequently accepting payment and providing change to the customerthrough the familiar scenario of buying donuts at a local donut shop.Students are provided with such artifacts as the donut shop's menu, government publications for calculating sales tax, and donut shop photos.Students are primed for success through preliminary laboratory assignments separately focusing on the professional responsibilities for calculating sales tax, making change, and formatting monetary output while emphasizing the importance of breaking problems down into their components.This approach has successfully been used as our first "major" CS1 programming assignment, as demonstrated by both quantitative and qualitative post-activity survey data.Interested readers are encouraged to download all materials associated with this assignment via the provided Engineering Unleashed resource link.