Catalogs of C and Python Antipatterns by CS1 Students

TL;DR

This paper presents catalogs of 41 programming antipatterns in C and Python, derived from analyzing student code, to better understand misconceptions and improve teaching strategies in introductory programming courses.

Contribution

It introduces a systematic catalog of antipatterns for C and Python based on student code analysis, aiding educators in identifying misconceptions.

Findings

Cataloged 41 antipatterns from 95 misconceptions

Analyzed 166 students' solutions in CS1 courses

Provided code examples and solutions for each antipattern

Abstract

Understanding students' programming misconceptions is critical. Doing so depends on identifying the reasons why students make errors when learning a new programming language. Knowing the misconceptions can help students to improve their reflection about their mistakes and also help instructors to design better teaching strategies. In this technical report, we propose catalogs of antipatterns for two programming languages: C and Python. To accomplish this, we analyzed the codes of 166 CS1 engineering students when they were coding solutions to programming exercises. In our results, we catalog 41 CS1 antipatterns from 95 cataloged misconceptions in C and Python. These antipatterns were separated into three catalogs: C, Python, and antipatterns found in code using both programming languages. For each antipattern, we present code examples, students' solutions (if they are present), a possible solution to avoid the antipattern, among other information.