In their first Formal Languages and Automata Theory course students find Turing machine composition challenging. In addition to the development of formal arguments, most students struggle with the idea that a Turing machine may use auxiliary Turing machines to solve a problem. This struggle is significant despite understanding that the use of auxiliary Turing machines is tantamount to using auxiliary functions in a program. This article presents two visualization tools developed to help students understand Turing machine composition. These tools are integrated into FSM–a domain-specific functional language for the Automata Theory classroom. The first is a static visualization tool that generates the transition diagram of a given composed Turing machine. The second is an interactive tool that simulates the execution of a given composed Turing machine. Empirical data collected from students is presented that suggests that the tools are well-received, easy to use, and useful.
Thu 24 OctDisplayed time zone: Pacific Time (US & Canada) change
10:40 - 12:20 | |||
10:40 20mTalk | Gender Differences in Story, Game and Visual Adventures in Hedy SPLASH-E Shirley de Wit Delft University of Technology, Felienne Hermans Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Marcus Specht Delft University of Technology, Efthimia Aivaloglou Delft University of Technology | ||
11:00 20mTalk | Roles of Variables in the Hedy programming language SPLASH-E Julia Vanwijnsberghe-Bolt Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Felienne Hermans Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam | ||
11:20 20mBreak | SPLASH-E Break SPLASH-E | ||
11:40 20mTalk | Using Computation Graphs to Explain Nondeterminism to Students SPLASH-E | ||
12:00 20mTalk | Visualizing Composed Turing Machines SPLASH-E |