Hey! I worked on the preliminary efforts of this project in 2012, and was also a grader for the course. (I'm "Gibbons, A." in the citation list)
Many people are making great points - there's a wealth of uncontrolled variables (ie some students already know how to program), but it was a fascinating dataset and I could even see the paradigms play out over the quarter during discussions with my students, both experienced programmers and students getting their first exposure to programming.
I would offer as a larger takeaway that work like this has the potential to vastly increase our understanding of learning and development with the rise of MOOCs, ipads-in-every-classroom, and of course IDEs that save every incremental compilation :-)
Oh and as another mention - working with Marcelo and Paulo was awesome, both are super passionate, intelligent dudes.
Many people are making great points - there's a wealth of uncontrolled variables (ie some students already know how to program), but it was a fascinating dataset and I could even see the paradigms play out over the quarter during discussions with my students, both experienced programmers and students getting their first exposure to programming.
I would offer as a larger takeaway that work like this has the potential to vastly increase our understanding of learning and development with the rise of MOOCs, ipads-in-every-classroom, and of course IDEs that save every incremental compilation :-)
Oh and as another mention - working with Marcelo and Paulo was awesome, both are super passionate, intelligent dudes.