Thinking and Behaving Scientifically in Computer Science: When Failure is an Option!

In a Finnish study of four different academic disciplines, Ylijoki (2000) found that in Computer Science there was a disparity between the conceptions held by undergraduate students and staff about their discipline; students viewed it as being far more pragmatic and results focused than did their instructors. Not surprisingly, here at our Australian university where the undergraduate Computer Science program emphasizes programming and problem solving skills, the authors had noticed a similar inconsistency between staff and student beliefs. This paper reports on an effort to realign these conceptions and broaden student experience using an assessment task. Centered on solutions to the popular ‘Sudoku’ puzzle (Sudoku, 2005), the task was designed and introduced into an Intelligent Systems course, a final year elective of a Computer Science degree. The goal was to expose students to some of the ‘pure’ rather than applied aspects of the Computer Science discipline (Becher & Trowler, 2001), by using assessment to encourage experimental learning (Kolb & Fry, 1975).