=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2845/Paper_38.pdf
|storemode=property
|title=Methodology of Building Agile-Education Processes in Higher Education Institutions
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2845/Paper_38.pdf
|volume=Vol-2845
|authors=Victoriia Mironova,Mykola Pyroh,Iryna Harko
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/iti2/MironovaPH20
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==Methodology of Building Agile-Education Processes in Higher Education Institutions==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2845/Paper_38.pdf
Methodology of Building Agile-Education Processes in Higher
Education Institutions
Viktoriia Mironovaa, Mykola Pyroha and Iryna Harkoa,b
a
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Bohdana Havrylyshyna St, 24, Kyiv, 04116, Ukraine
b
National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute”, Politekhnichna St, 41,
Academic building № 18, Kyiv, 03056, Ukraine
Abstract
In this paper the technology of using the popular flexible software development methodology
– agile – is considered for the development and construction of courses and semantic links of
higher education disciplines for training specialists in the field of information technology.
The authors analyze the basic principles of the Agile-Manifest and their application for the
formation of the curriculum program and the students' training disciplines. The presented
article considers the result the flexible agile software development methodology
implementation into the process of higher education students teaching. We present
approaches to the educational process modernization, educational and methodological
support development and approaches to teaching in high school on the example of the
discipline “Web technologies and site programming” for students in specialty 122 Computer
Science in educational program “Applied Programming”. The article describes the results of
several years gradual adaptation of Agile technology to the learning process, its introduction
into the learning process and the results of the developed methodology approbation. The
theoretical bases and advantages of Agile-methodology over the classical scheme of training,
which we define as “direct” or “cascade”, are considered. In order to effectively study the
impact of flexible methodologies on the educational process, approaches to the formation of
experimental and control academic students groups are presented. The dynamics of
laboratory work timeliness and comparison of the academic groups final results are given.
The influence of Agile-methodology on the academic groups success is considered and a
statistical comparison with the classical approach to teaching is made. Also, we determined
the directions of further research on the topic of Agile-methodology implementation in the
educational process taking into account the urgency of the education transformation issue in
Ukraine and professional training of specialists in the field of information technology.
Keywords1
agile-methodology, scrum, education, Information Technology, training of specialists,
professional training.
1. Introduction
Training of specialists in the field of information technologies requires the formation of
educational programs and courses using modern technologies, programming languages, libraries and
frameworks. However, the rapid growth and changing trends in the IT sector makes it impossible to
create such a program even for four years of bachelor's degree [1]. That is, even if at the beginning of
the educational cycle, the program was designed taking into account the most relevant approaches and
topics, at the time of graduation, it becomes obsolete. To understand the need to adapt to such
changes, it is worth estimating the frequency of programming languages standards updates and
IT&I-2020: Information Technology and Interactions, 2-3 December, 2020, Kyiv, Ukraine
EMAIL: vicky.mironova@gmail.com (V. Mironova); mykola.pyroh@yahoo.com (M. Pyroh); garko.iryna@gmail.com (I. Harko)
ORCID: 0000-0002-0878-0967 (V. Mironova); 0000-0003-2588-6066 (M. Pyroh); 0000-0003-0671-6336 (I. Harko)
©️ 2020 Copyright for this paper by its authors.
Use permitted under Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
CEUR Workshop Proceedings (CEUR-WS.org)
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releases, which are 1-3 years for Java, 3 years for C ++ and from six months to 3 years in C#. And
even more, programming libraries and frameworks are released almost each month.
To help higher education institutions to adopt their materials and educational programs, we
propose the introduction of an adaptive methodology based on Agile methodology [2]. Such approach
should promote the development of future IT professionals' skills, help student to quickly master new
material and be flexible at the IT industry fast-paced market [3].
2. Principles of Agile-education processes
Agile management – an iterative method of planning and managing projects and processes [2].
Agile management allocates short product development cycles, providing additional updates
depending on changing customer needs. In 2001, Kent Beck, Martin Fowler, Dave Thomas, and 14
other leading software practitioners published the Agile Manifesto, which was a brief description of
some of the easy software development technique principles. Agile-Manifesto describes the principles
of “flexible” methodology of software development and implementation: priority of customer
interests, openness to change, system operation at all times, mobile joint teams “customer-developer-
user” with a high level of communication. Flexibility and adaptability are that the Agile client outlines
the task, sets the direction, and the team thinks how to solve this problem. The team can change the
path to the goal and implement the client's plans in any way convenient for them. According to
Agile's principles, the client's business goals, his wishes are more important than the initial conditions
and documentation. Another difference between Agile and traditional control schemes is the process
algorithm. The traditional management model involves a gradual movement from the stage of analysis
to the stage of production. Agile consists of cyclically repeating sprints (Sprint), in other words a
number of stages of continuous product implementation and adjustment (fig 1.).
Figure 1: Agile-methodology Scheme
If we consider the process of training a specialist in higher education in terms of project
management, and the specialist – as a unique product, the training can be approached from the
standpoint of project management and apply to this process all modern and successful project
management methodologies. Due to the success of the Agile approach in industry, software design,
marketing and business, foreign experts in the field of education have tried to apply similar principles
to the field of education, thus forming the Agile Schools Manifesto:
people and interaction are more important than processes and tools;
significant knowledge is more important than learning;
cooperation with stakeholders is more important than complex negotiations;
readiness for change is more important than following the original plan.
12 agile principles adapted to the school were also formed. The same principles are easy to
implement in the field of higher education and training:
1. Education results through continuous learning of the discipline
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2. Divide large chunks of study and materials into smaller and achievable tasks for quicker
completion and easier mastering the proper skills
3. Adhere to the decided timeframe for the delivery of a completed tasks and homeworks
4. Students and teacher must frequently collaborate to ensure that the education is going in the
correct direction
5. Create a supportive environment to motivate students and encouraging them to get the job
done
6. Prefer face-to-face communication over other methods
7. Knowledge of theoretical and practical materials is the primary measure of progress
8. Try to maintain a constant pace of learning
9. Maintain the quality of study by paying attention to technical details
10. Maintain simplicity
11. Promote self-organization in the team
12. Regularly reflect on your performance for continuous improvement
EduScrum's [4] theory and methodology are based on the empirical theory of process management
or empiricism. Empiricism states that knowledge comes from experience and decision-making based
on knowledge and information. eduScrum uses an iterative, consistent approach to optimizing the
achievement of learning objectives and risk control. Three bases support each implementation of
empirical process control: transparency, verification and adaptation (fig 2).
• Common language
Transparency • Definition of Done (DoD)
• Education Goals
Verification • Feedback, Results
• Iteration review
Adaptation • Retrospective and Planing
Figure 2: The Education Empirical Methodology Basis
Transparency ensures the visibility of essential aspects of the process for those responsible for the
outcome. Transparency requires defining these aspects by a common standard, so observers have a
common understanding of what is seen. All participants in the process must communicate in one
language and understand all definitions.
Those who do the work and those who accept the work product must have a common definition of
“Ready”(DOR – Definition of Ready) and “Done” (DoD – Definition of Done). EduScrum users
should frequently check eduScrum artifacts and progress toward learning objectives for unwanted
deviations. These inspections are most effective in the case of diligent and systematic performance by
both teachers and students in the classroom. If the student (or teacher) determines that one or more
aspects of the process threaten to deviate from the defined boundaries and/or the results will be
unacceptable, the planning or approach should be adjusted as soon as possible to minimize further
deviations. The tools of such adaptation are planning, review of sprints and demonstration of results,
personal reflection.
Considering the rapid changes in the IT market and trends in demand for programming languages
we propose new Agile methodology of building educational programs in higher education institutions.
This methodology is built in concept of branched scheme based on the principles of flexible
methodology (fig. 3.) of software development “must do, should do, could do” [5].
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The difference of this approach comparing to classical cascade educational scheme is the
abandonment of the usual transition from the previous to the next work by dividing each topic into
differential tasks. This allow students to perform tasks clearly aware of the “degree of immersion” in
the topic. Thus, the part “must be done” is a direct task according to the material covered on a
particular topic, part “should be done” – a complex level of the task that provides additional
conditions to the functionality of the program within the passed topic of direct work and previous
work, the last part “can be done” – a task aimed at the active use of hours set aside for independent
work, this includes encouraging students to explore ways to improve the program code, its refactoring
and work towards clean code.
Figure 3: MoSCoW prioritization technique
According to the “Regulations on the organization of the educational process” [6] for independent
work is allocated from 50 to 67 percent of the time allotted for the study of the discipline.
To effectively use this time, in order to provide quality training for future professionals, we have
developed comprehensive tasks aimed not only to deepen students' knowledge, but also to give an
understanding of the self-organization of groups during the performance of complex work.
According to Agile Education, groups of 3 to 5 people are formed to perform a complex task,
which distribute roles in the group and build relationships according to the eduScrum methodology. In
this context, the teacher has the role of consultant-coordinator, who determines the requirements for
the functionality of integrated work, guides student groups in their search for information and helps to
develop skills of interaction, mutual assistance and mutual learning of group members.
Table 1 presents a fragment of the work program of the discipline "Web technologies and site
programming". According to its structure, according to the developed methodology, the plan of work
on a complex task is divided into stages (according to eduScrum – sprints), before the first stage
students receive tasks and are divided into groups that will work on their complex works. According
to the methodology, special meetings are provided to coordinate their actions in the group, where
students discuss their work in the group or identify problematic stages.
According to the Agile methodology, this thematic plan can be presented in the form of product
requirements and sprint goals (Table 2). After developing the plan, students begin work on the goals
and requirements of the product, which is to break the complex work into small tasks, which are
distributed among group members. Students determine the degree of “readiness” of each task, ie what
its state is considered to meet the goals of the group and can be defined as satisfactory for integration
into the product, and determine the priority of tasks according to the above scheme. The results of
such work are usually demonstrated in the form of an Agile board (fig. 4). During the sprint, each of
the tasks performed is moved on the board in the column "In progress", when the task corresponds to
DoD, it is moved to the column "Done". According to our plan, the teacher coordinates the activities
of student groups during retrospectives, which summarize the work of the group during the stage. In
retrospect, students report on the work done, closed tasks, uncompleted tasks, carry over to the next
stage tasks from the category “must be done”, if they were not completed during the current stage,
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and answer the theoretical questions. Thus, the presentation of the material encourages students to
make efforts to self-development in the influence of external, subjective and objective factors such as:
changes in the academic schedule.
changes in teaching methods and tools.
the need to turn to another technology.
the need to review the functionality of the product.
unpredictable changes in the development team.
Table 1.
Fragment of the table of the discipline "Web technologies and site programming" thematic plan
Topic Number and Title Hours
Lectures Practical Home
works works
Basics of HTML/CSS. Information content and 4 6 10
structure of the Web-site
Adaptive and Responsive Web Design. Media Queries 2 2 10
Table 2.
Objectives of the first sprint of the discipline "Web technologies and site programming" according to
the Agile methodology
Learning objective Key results
Master the basic principles of web- We know the basic principles and features of HTML.
site creation and html structure We can create a simple web-page using HTML/CSS.
Understand the differences of block and inline tags;
We can create semantic web page and validate it
according to W3C standard;
Master the methods of creating We know the structure and methods of using the
adaptive web-pages media queries for web-page creation
We understand the purpose of using viewport and its’
characteristics
We know the difference between relative and absolute
values and positioning
We can create a web-site that will be working on any
devices and screens
We understand the differences between adaptive and
responsive web-design technologies
Retrospective is an opportunity for the teacher to understand the needs of each student and student
teams, to adapt learning materials to individual perception, to adapt the goals and objectives of
subsequent sprints given the speed and quality of knowledge of the material by teams and individual
students. In addition, the goals of the sprint and its objectives may change under the influence of
external factors: time changes and changes in the schedule; changes in discipline requirements due to
changes in the labor market or the irrelevance of technology; changes in teaching methods and tools,
etc. The above processes give us a picture of the understanding of learning, which corresponds to the
classic scheme of eduScrum [8].
3. Agile-education methodology implementation
Proposed agile-education methodology was used to develop a more adaptive work curriculum of
the discipline “Web technologies and site programming” for students majoring in 122 Computer
Science educational program “Applied Programming” [7, 8]. Implementing the principles of Agile
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Education and own developments in the educational process, a method of teaching this discipline was
developed, which without violating the structure and educational norms at the Taras Shevchenko
National University of Kyiv [6]. Proposed approach can make the learning process to be more
adaptive to changing requirements and each individual group speed of learning and mastering
practical skills. This approach to complex tasks was tested by the authors in the 2018/2019 and
2019/2020 academic years. This approach contributes to the interpretation of the usual learning
process as a long-term project using Agile-methodology [9]. However, after two years of testing the
methodology, the authors decided to adapt this approach to laboratory work [7, 8].
Figure 4: A fragment of the Agile-Sprint discipline board
At the beginning of the article we outlined a certain adaptation of a set of laboratory works to the
Agile methodology. Therefore, in the 2019/2020 academic year, it was decided to adapt the
methodology of group work for laboratory tasks. In order to assess the effectiveness of the
methodology in the full cycle of studying the discipline “Web technologies and site programming” in
the presence of two groups (50 students), divided into four subgroups (10-15 students), in the current
academic year it was decided to teach two subgroups Agile methodology (experimental groups: EG1,
EG2), and two – according to established methodologies (control groups: CG1, CG2) (Table 3).
The discipline “Web technologies and site programming” is studied in the third year in the second
semester. The experiment was conducted in the second semester of the 2019/2020 academic year
while studying the basics of programming web-sites. That is why, in order to ensure the normal
distribution of students into groups according to the level of initial training, the points of their average
marks gained during education on the faculty, were used as data.
Table 3.
Distribution of students by groups
Control group (CG) Experimental group (EG) Total
First Group 10 11 21
Second Group 15 14 29
Total 25 25 50
In Agile subgroups (EG1 and EG2) students were divided into groups of 3-4 people working on
tasks together. These students received complex tasks, taking into account the teamwork and
defended them together, including a package of theoretical questions. In subgroups KG1 and KG2
laboratory work was performed according to the classical “cascade” scheme. According to the results
of the exam, the average score of students in all subgroups was calculated (Table 4).
As you can see, students in the control groups who studied in the traditional format, on average,
received 14.18 points less than students in the experimental subgroups. It is also worth noting that the
average score of students in the second group is 0.93 higher than that of students in the first group.
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Similar dynamics is observed in the corresponding control and experimental subgroups: the average
score in the experimental subgroup of the first group (EG1) exceeds the average score in the control
subgroup of the same group (CG1) by 13.58 points, while for subgroups EG2 and CG2 this difference
is 14.78 points. It is also worth noting that students in the second group generally study better and
have higher scores. Figures 5,6 show the distribution of final points in the discipline for students of all
subgroups.
Table 4.
Average score of students by groups
Control group (CG) Experimental group (EG1) Total
First Group 69.6 83.18 76.39
Second Group 69.93 84.71 77.32
Total 69.77 83.95 76.86
Studying the graphs presented in Figures 2 and 4, we can see that for the experimental groups the
distribution of final scores in the discipline is significantly shifted to the right, in the subgroup EG2
the maximum occurs in the range of 90-100 points. In the control subgroups CG1 and CG2 the
percentage of students who received a final grade of “excellent” (90 points and above) – 10% and
13.33% respectively, in the experimental subgroups EG1 and EG2 this figure is higher – 36.36% and
35.71%, respectively. At the same time, in the experimental subgroups there is no student with a score
below 60, and in the control subgroups the percentage of such students is: CG1 – 20% and CG2 –
13.33%.
Figure 5: Distribution of final points in the discipline for students of the first group by subgroups
For a more detailed analysis of the effectiveness of the implementation of Agile-methodology and
to identify the features of students' learning in different learning technologies, an equally important
indicator was considered – the timeliness of students' laboratory work. A positive feature of the use of
Agile-methodology in experimental subgroups is that students within microgroups (3-4 people) had a
motivational influence on each other, which prompted them to perform all tasks with deadlines, which
was reflected in the dynamics of timeliness of their laboratory works (Fig. 7).
Thus, we see that the percentage of students who performed laboratory work on time in the
experimental subgroups ranges from 79-90%, while this figure for the control subgroups remained at
54-62%. In addition, in the control subgroups there was a violation of the deadlines for laboratory
work for 3 or more weeks in 19-20% of students, in contrast to 2-5% in the experimental subgroups
(Table 5). According to the results of the study, we can state that Agile-groups submitted materials
with better compliance with deadlines, and group work encouraged students to help each other in the
studied theories, which was a condition for successful delivery of laboratory work.
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Figure 6: Distribution of final points in the discipline for students of the second group by subgroups
Table 5.
Dynamics of laboratory work timeliness by groups
CG1 EG1 CG2 EG2
Timely execution 54% 79% 62% 90%
Deadline violation – 1 week 14% 12% 11% 6%
Deadline violation – 2 weeks 11% 5% 9% 3%
Deadline violation – 3 weeks 12% 1% 9% 1%
Deadline violation – more than 3 weeks 8% 4% 10% 1%
4. Conclusions
The introduction of flexible methodologies in the educational process optimizes approaches in the
training of future IT professionals. The implementations of the flexible methodology of software
development – Agile – in the process of development of educational and methodical support and the
proposed approaches in teaching in higher education contribute not only to better understanding and
mastering by students of theoretical and practical educational material.
This approach also helps students understand the production processes in IT projects that are set up
according to the Agile methodology, set themselves to work within Scrum, gives an initial idea of the
complexity of the task, mandatory and additional product requirements – their knowledge of the
discipline. Agile and Scrum methodologies allow to develop and implement a modern, adapted to the
requirements of the labor market training program for IT professionals and helps to develop skills to
find the necessary information and interact with peers, which will also help further training and
improve their “soft skills”. The introduction of Agile-methodology in the educational process
radically changes the attitude of students to learning and stimulates their systematic educational work,
which in turn affects the quality of work and compliance with deadlines. This allows for a more
objective and differentiated assessment of student performance and develops opportunities for a
personal-activity approach to learning. We are convinced that the introduction of flexible
methodologies in the educational process of training students in technical specialties should become
an integral part of the transformation of higher education.
In addition to the above, the proposed approach is more successfully combined with distance
learning, which is dictated to us by the realities of today. With the beginning of the quarantine period
of COVID-19 in higher educational institutions of Ukraine, the authors adapted the developed
approach to the online mode of conducting lectures and practical classes. Maps have been developed
to study the entire discipline and connections of each module, so that students in isolation, even
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without constant Internet access, can go independently on the map of the module and occasionally
adjust their work according to the requirements of the team and the teacher. Agile-methodology of
studying disciplines in distance format will be developed in further research and presented together
with the results of the proposed adaptation to distance learning in the following articles.
Figure 7: Dynamics of timeliness of laboratory work for students of all subgroups
5. References
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[5] MoSCoW Prioritisation, Coley Consulting [Online]. Available: https://cutt.ly/ryB5n4S.
[6] Regulations on the organization of the educational process at the Taras Shevchenko National
University of Kyiv, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, 2018 [Online].
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[8] V. Mironova, M. Pyroh, and I. Harko, "Agile-methodology and informatization of the
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