Identifying Students' Mental Model for Java']Java Programming Subject

Since the beginning of learning programming, the first-year student felt intimidated when learning to programme. Coding ability is a basic competency as a programmer, especially for Computer Science students. The limitation of class study time requires a self-learning. This study will identify students' Mental Model to help define the design of tailored e-learning in programming subject. This study was exploratory research involving 100 students that were purposively sampling from five departments. They answered an online questionnaire containing 16 questions about motivation to learn, competency levels, reasons/constraints in learning, efforts to learn, and expectations about the proposed systems. In the second session data collection, 20 students were selected who had detailed answers, and they represented each department. These twenty students were involved in the Focus Group Discussion to produce a mutually agreed mental model. The results are students believe that the programming logic is difficult to understand; the syntax is hard to remember, the logic is difficult to implement into coding, the students feel overwhelmed and the unsupported environment. The solution was found through a mental model in the form of the grouping of features that consider cognitive, behavioral, and student competency levels in programming subject, especially in Java Programming The future work of this research is the simplification of learning material to provide the right portion for students by applying the three levels of mental models, so that proposed e-learning can accommodate learning needs of various user needs.