Logic abilities and mental representations of the informatical device in acquisition of conditional structures by 15–16 year old students

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During the acquisition of programming concepts prior knowledge may serve as «precursor» and interacts with the informatical concepts; nevertheless the integration of prior knowledge in the new informatical frame requires forming mental representations on this device. Two experiments on conditional structures (on 10th grade students) are reported: they show that logical knowledge is a prerequisite to the acquisition of conditional structures but is not sufficient to insure acquisition. Properties of natural communication are used by many beginners when they need to handle dialog with an informatical device in programming tasks. A model, termed the PRES-model is defined, which accounts for the discrepancy observed between logical knowledge and success on programming tasks.