Abstract
The need for organized computing education efforts dates back to the 1950s. Since then, computing education research (CER) has evolved and matured from its early initiatives and separation from mathematics education into a respectable research specialization of its own. In recent years, a number of meta-research papers, reviews, and scientometric studies have built overviews of CER from various perspectives. This paper continues that approach by offering new perspectives on the past and present state of CER: analyses of influential papers throughout the years, of the theoretical backgrounds of CER, of the institutions and authors who create CER, and finally of the top publication venues and their citation practices. The results reveal influential contributions from early curriculum guidelines to rigorous empirical research of today, the prominence of computer programming as a topic of research, evolving patterns of learning-theory usage, the dominance of high-income countries and a cluster of 52 elite institutions, and issues regarding citation practices within the central venues of dissemination.
Highlights
In the past 20–25 years, computing education research (CER) has matured from being an interest of teachers in colleges and universities, from all walks of computing research, into a respectable research specialization of its own [1], [2]
DEDICATED VENUES SEARCH All publications from well-known CER venues were included in the data extraction. These included the two major journals dedicated to CER, which are Computer Science Education (CSE), established in 1988 [14, p. 1], and Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Transactions on Computing Education (TOCE), whose inaugural issue was published in March 2009 [54]
Due to the large numbers of non-CER articles, those venues were excluded from full inclusion, but in order to still capture a representative sample of CER from outside the realm of the dedicated venues, a search query was performed in Scopus to find additional relevant research in computing education that has been published in venues that are not mainly devoted to this field
Summary
In the past 20–25 years, computing education research (CER) has matured from being an interest of teachers in colleges and universities, from all walks of computing research, into a respectable research specialization of its own [1], [2]. One scientometric study investigated the publications in the ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education (FIE) conference from the viewpoint of most cited papers, influential authors, and internalization [45], while another analysis of FIE looked at sources of funding [46] Another piece of research scientometrically analyzed the keywords in ITiCSE and ICER papers [47], showing, for instance, a steady trend of research on introductory programming courses. The combined body of literature reviews, meta-research, and scientometric analyses of CER paints a picture of CER evolving over the decades from experience reports to empirical research; increased attention paid to learning theories, research methods, and reporting rigor; sustained focus on programming education; and dominance of high-income countries, especially the US. No previous scientometric or other analyses have covered all central CER publication venues, over many decades, and offered a holistic analysis of citations, keyword trends, foundational work, dissemination, and core institutions that create CER.
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