Reflecting on e-Assessment Practices and Students' Performance in a Java Programming Course.

e-Assessment is critical for the implementation of an effective e-learning approach. This paper reports the authors' reflection on e-assessment practices that were deployed in teaching a Java programming subject, and the academic performance of students at a South African University of Technology. The study presents a reflective analysis of students' performance records over three years and the e-assessment practices that were applied over this period. To do this, a research design that is based on data collection from the archive, data analysis, and analytical reflection on adopted eassessment practices was employed. The study revealed that an effective formative assessment strategy is a major determinant of good performance by students when a programming language subject is being taught. The results of the study showed that significant improvement in the performance of the student cohort of Year 3, coincides with increased deliberate use of e-assessment for formative assessments. This suggests that e-assessment is a major enabler of an effective formative assessment strategy that is beneficial for students and lecturers. The study also highlighted the impact of other contextual factors such as experience and quality of the lecturer team, stability of the learning environment, personal motivation and aptitudes of the student cohort, as capable of influencing overall the performance of students in a taught programming subject. The lessons from the study are relevant to many developing-country contexts where teachers need to deal with students that have limited programming experience before taking their first programming subject at the university. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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