A First Look at Novice Compilation Behaviour Using BlueJ

Syntactically correct code does not fall from the sky; the process that leads to a student's first executable program is not well understood. At the University of Kent we have begun to explore the compilation behaviours of novice programmers, or the behaviours that students exhibit while authoring code; in our initial study, we have focused on when and what they choose to compile. By examining these behaviours, we have determined the most common errors encountered by students using BlueJ in our introductory course on object-oriented programming, how those students tend to program when in supervised laboratory sessions, and we have identified future directions of study driven by our initial observations. Our goal is to apply this research to the future development of BlueJ and instructional methodologies involving its use in the classroom.