Computer science education research develops new approaches for the teaching and learning of computer science. My work draws on educational psychology and human-computer interaction to develop systems that address practical issues of teaching and learning. I also explore how different aspects of computer science knowledge develop, and what kinds of assessments can reveal nuances in understanding.

In this talk I will focus on the code structure choices of intermediate undergraduate CS students. For different options with the same functionality, students often don't realize which structures an expert would prefer; students may not agree that those structures are better; and students may not comprehend those structures as well as alternatives. Supporting students in writing well-structured code is hard because hand-inspection of code is tedious. My lab is developing automated detectors for certain structures, which can help. Most important, compared to just focusing on functionality of students' written code, attention to how students think about code structure can give us a fuller picture of students' understanding of programming concepts.