On Understanding Teaching Modelingin Computer Science as an Ecosystem

Martin Gogolla

University of Bremen, Germany

What is an ecosystem?

What is an ecosystem?

● Community of living organisms in conjunction with nonliving components of environment (e.g. air, water, soil).

● Interacting as a system.

● Biotic factors as well as abiotic factors.

● Self supporting.

● Components linked through nutrient cycles and energy flows.

● Network of interactions among organisms, andbetween organisms and their environment.

● Any size.

● Usually encompasses limited space.

What is an ecosystem?

● Factors and dimensions (in example): soil, water, air, climate, sun, animals, plants, harvest, fields, housing, growth, energy flow (production, consumption)

● Content

– modeling techniques use case modeling

– model qualities abstraction

– modeling style domain-specific

● Medium Excel

● Demonstrations industrial case study

● Actors tutor

● Timing 3rd year undergraduate

● Form project 10 ECTS

● Style gamification

● (Involved CS) Areas articial intelligence

● Environment legal requirements

Factors and dimensions in teaching modeling

Content Medium Demonstrations Actors Timing Form Style Areas Environment

● Content

– modeling techniques

● class diagrams, state charts, ...● profiles, ...● bx trafos, ... model - structure, behavior, organisation

– model qualities and characteristics

● classification, abstraction, structuredness, appropriateness● clearness, understandability● verifiability, executability

– modeling style

● textual..graphical● universal..domain-specific● semi-formal..formal

Detailed factors and dimensions

Content Medium Demonstrations Actors Timing Form Style Areas Environment

● Medium

– blackboard, sheet

– UML @ Magic Draw

– USE, Umple, EMFtoCSP

– Excel, Power point, yEd

– Java, SQL, ATL

● Demonstrations (examples, case studies)

– tiny..large, vague..detailed, concrete..abstract

– positive..negative, academic..industrial

– suitability for modeling technique

– cases at different development stages or refinement levels

Detailed factors and dimensions

Content Medium Demonstrations Actors Timing Form Style Areas Environment

● Actors

– researcher, teacher, lecturer

– student, tutor

– programmer, designer

– examination administrator, technician, dean

● Timing

– undergraduate, graduate, phd, education for professionals

– Gogolla: basics of dbs, dbs, design of information systems

● Form

– lecture, exercise, course, seminar

– homework, project, thesis

– research paper

Detailed factors and dimensions

Content Medium Demonstrations Actors Timing Form Style Areas Environment

● Style

– teacher-in-front, group work

– traditional..gamified

– research-oriented..trainee-oriented

● (Involved CS) Areas

– programming languages, information systems, networks

– theory

– artificial Intelligence, sw engineering

● Environment

– curricula

– institution, related curricula & institutions

– colleagues, law

Detailed factors and dimensions

Content Medium Demonstrations Actors Timing Form Style Areas Environment

Factors and dimensions – Ecosystem relationships

● Content: Model qualities and characteristics

– abstraction, classification, executability, verifiability, appropriateness

● Demonstrations

– cases at different development stages or refinement levels

– negative examples

● Actors

– teaching researcher .. professional teacher

● Timing

– modeling before programming

● Areas

– identification of confederate CS areas and their integration

● Environment

– MODELS conference: Edusymp..Tutorials

Factors needing attention and improvement

● Content: Model qualities and characteristics

– abstraction, classification, executability, verifiability, appropriateness

● currently neglected: `traditional´ modeling languages (flowcharts, automata, er, 1st order predicate calculus, graphs)

● focus on `modern´ modeling languages (UML, OCL, SYSML, EMF, ATL, QVT)

● focus on teaching techniques not onmodel qualities like abstraction or classification

● models in their representing medium should give feedbackabout verifiabilty or executability

Factors needing attention and improvement

Is it possible to teach `when and how to use abstraction´?

Demonstrations with abstract classes with structure and behavior!

abstraction = reductionrelative to a concern

● Demonstrations

– cases at different development stages or refinement levels

– negative examples

● not only presentation of perfect, non-developing cases

discusssion of development steps and their rationals

presentation of models at various levels of detail

● negative examples that show how students should not model

Factors needing attention and improvement

● Actors

– teaching researcher .. professional teacher

● teaching typically done from our research perspective

teaching of our own research results

● research-oriented vs. trainee-oriented teaching method

● teach what students help in a way they undertstand

Factors needing attention and improvement

● Timing

– modeling before programming

● is modeling done too late?

● often modeling is regarded as `documenting the code´

● ban programming from the first years of CS education

Factors needing attention and improvement

● Areas

– identification of confederate CS areas and their integration

● modeling done in many (all?) CS areas

● modeling community looks from outside like to re-invent the wheel

● identification of partners resp. confederates

● connecting `their´ modeling to our view on modeling

Factors needing attention and improvement

● Environment

– MODELS conference: Edusymp..Tutorials

● Edusymp and Tutorials separated at MODELS

● no common strategy

● tutorials as a place for MODEL education or teaching

● `Bridge´ tutorials from core modeling to other CS areas

Factors needing attention and improvement

Factors needing attention and improvement

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