Teaching independent novice learners to develop relational database applications

Abstract

The teaching of relational database design and construction is a major challenge for teachers of introductory Information Systems courses. Some problems are further exacerbated when teaching of independent learners by correspondence is involved. We first describe our experience with teaching database application development and suggest two significant conceptual difficulties that have affected students working from widely used textbooks. We then describe a simple approach aimed specifically at these difficulties. When this approach was introduced recently, anecdotal evidence suggests that learning in the area has been significantly improved.