An Australasian study of reading and comprehension skills in novice programmers, using the bloom and SOLO taxonomies

Abstract

In this paper we report on a multi-institutional investigation into the reading and comprehension skills of novice programmers. This work extends previous studies (Lister 2004, McCracken 2001) by developing a question set within two key pedagogical frameworks: the Bloom and SOLO taxonomies. From this framework of analysis some interesting emergent patterns relating the cognitive level of the questions to student performance have been identified. Keywords: Bloom’s Taxonomy, SOLO, novice programming, multi-institutional.