Journal of Engineering Education Transformations

Abstract

Evidence of a knee-jerk reaction of despair among freshman computer engineering students is not uncommon. It is not the programming environment like the coding language itself that weighs down on them, but rather the shift in their thoughts that they need to bring in for solving a problem. Some people are born problem-solvers, some are not. But most of us lie in between, which means that most of us tend to solve issues and cross hurdles, sometimes in one go and sometimes by hit and trial. The only way to do this is to consciously think logically. But is it as easy as turning a key and opening the lock? How do you open the complex box of your thinking abilities? Engineering graduates must think from a different angle to the solutions to make themselves ready for the tough competitions. These freshman students therefore find themselves in a spot when it comes to forming and then implementing logic in their coding. A study has been conducted to see if this gap between school curriculum and learning programming subject in their first year can be filled in a conscious phased manner to improve their logic building. Various logic building techniques were put to practical use to study if the outcomes can be affected and the programming skills of students enhanced. In this paper, we see the methodology used to bring a group of students to a level where they are comfortable with logic building and are no longer wary of the solution finding.