Investigation of factors affecting two-year vocational college students' computer programming achievement

The purpose of this study is to explore the factors that influence two-year vocational college students' achievement in computer programming and to examine whether a relationship exists between students' achievement in computer programming with demographic information (gender , the type of school that they have graduated from , past experience with programming , overall academic grade point averages) , problem-solving and analytical thinking skills , personal self-efficacy and motivation , self-regulated learning strategies , (goal setting , internal target , external target , self-efficacy , self-reflection , valuing , metacognition). Correlational method was utilized for this study . The dependent variable of the research is the academic achievement of students in a computer programming course. The independent variables are demographic information , motivation , self-efficacy , self-regulated learning strategies. Demographic information questionnaire , problem solving inventory , the scale of self-regulated learning strategies , general self-efficacy scale and programming achievement test were used as data collection instruments in the research . The research was conducted in two- year vocational college students of computer programming departments in Bozok University-Akdağmadeni two-year vocational college, Adnan Menderes University-Aydın two-year vocational college, Ahi Evran University- Kaman two-year vocational college. Results showed that a significant relationship exists between the student achievement in computer programming and gender, type of school , overall academic grade point averages , motivation, self-efficacy from self-regulated learning strategies. 23% of the total variance of the student achievement in computer programming can be explained by demographic characteristics , problem-solving and analytical thinking skills , personal self-efficacy , motivational variables and 18% can be explained by self-regulated learning strategies.