Difficulties in solving ill-defined problems: A case study with introductory computer programming students

In this paper we report a case study carried out in the first academic semester of 2008 with novice programming students of the computer science course at the Federal University of Campina Grande. This case study aimed at observing and evaluating strategies adopted by students on ill-defined problem solving. The results of this case study showed that students found it hard to perform problem statement exploratory reading and interpretation, formulate questions to enlighten the problem, analyze the problem constrains and error occurrence, write tests to check non-obvious situations and also to register effectively the new problem information acquired by discussing with client. The present paper also reports on some pedagogic possibilities to improve the introductory programming teaching.