OER Tools and Courses for Teaching Database Systems as Developed in the Project EILD.nrw

Abstract

In the EILD.nrw project, Open Educational Resources (OER) are being developed for teaching databases. Instructors can use the tools and courses in a variety of learning scenarios. Students of computer science and application subjects learn the complete life cycle of databases. For this purpose, quizzes, interactive tools, instructional videos, and courses for learning management systems are developed and published under a Creative Commons license.

Keywords

• 1 Database systems
• OER
• higher education

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© 2022 Copyright for this paper by its authors. Use permit ed under Creative Commons License At ribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).

CEUR Workshop Proceedings (CEUR-WS.org) semester in supported self-study and work on practical tasks for the conception, creation, and programming of databases.

Due to the intended use in basic courses, the content is in German. Translatability into other languages is intended, but there are no funds available for this in the project, so the OER community will be approached for voluntary work. However, learning instructions for Germanlanguage textbooks, for example, can only be mapped into other language settings with a great effort.

For quality assurance, the learning and teaching modules created in the project are used and evaluated in current teaching [ 5 ]. Scaled answers are supplemented with free text entries. The anonymously submitted evaluations of the students were visible to the students in the course. Due to the transparency, the students can compare their answers with other learners. The evaluation of the feedback and an outlook on how it is considered are also presented in the course. The quantitative information enables the assessment by the students to be recorded. The information on the actual processing time of tasks, for example, made it possible to check the workload specifications in the module manual. Combined with qualitative feedback, improvements can be made.

Several tools from the life cycle of databases such as modeling, relational data model, SQL and functionality and structure of database systems have been developed by the project partners or are nearing completion. In courses on selected subject areas, the tools are used in specific learning scenarios. Learning units on NoSQL database systems and the analysis of large amounts of multimedia data are developed as advanced topics.

1. The MCT-trainer contains over 1300 questions on database system concepts. In related quizzes, solution hints and explanations in the final evaluation enable an understanding of the correct answers. The question can be adopted to specific needs by database operations. 2. Modeling with the entity-relationship diagram can be practiced in the ERD-trainer using several application examples. The different notations for describing the cardinality of relationships can be compared interactively for binary relationships. The mapping to a relational schema into the relational schema can be done interactively in the ER-mapping-trainer. 3. A Moodle course contains an introduction to the relational data model with tutorial videos, reading tips and practical exercises on unary and binary operations and normalization. The tool RelaX of the University of Innsbruck [ 1 ] used to execute relational expressions is introduced with a screencast. The NF-trainer contains tasks for the transfer to the first, second and third normal form. The course contains commented references to textbooks, evaluation results, didactic recommendations for use in teaching and technical framework conditions. 4. The SQL-trainer and the PL/SQL-trainer offer an interactive learning application for SQL statements (DDL, DQL, DML) based on SQLite or for interactively practicing triggers, functions, and procedures. The use of Oracle SQLcl® (command line interpreter) is explained in a screencast. 5. The structure and functionality of database management systems are presented with the serialization-trainer for synchronizing parallel transactions and the B-tree-animator for interactive creation of an index 6. For the area of NoSQL databases, learning modules with instructional videos, pools of questions, case studies, online exercises and associated model solutions are integrated into learning sequences in the learning management system ILIAS. 7. The text and image-based introduction to data analysis presents specific problems, enables users to solve a problem interactively and contains questions with integrated feedback.

Modifiability and extensibility to adapt didactic preparation, integrability to a learning environment, and free availability are essential for using the tools and courses as OER. These requirements are met using open environments such as JavaScript, SQLite, Jupyter notebooks, the useability for freely available learning management systems such as Moodle and ILIAS as well as SCORM, software versioning via GitHub provisioning [ 7 ], inclusion of didactic descriptions and evaluation results within courses, and accessibility via the ORCA.nrw platform [ 6 ].

References

[1] J. Kessler , M. Tschuggnall , M. , G. Specht , G.: RelaX: A Webbased Execution and Learning Tool for Relational Algebra . In: T. Grust et al.: BTW 2019 , S. 503 - 506 . Gesellschaft für Informatik, Bonn. https://dx.doi.org/10.18420/btw2019- 32 .

[2] EILD.nrw Website. https://eild.nrw. Access August 16 , 2022 .

[3] T.C. Rakow , H. Faeskorn-Woyke , I.M. Saatz , H. Knolle: Es EILD - Anforderungen an die Publikation freier Lerneinheiten (OER) im Fach Datenbanken . DatenbankSpektrum , 2 ( 12 ) 111 - 120 . Springer-Verlag, Berlin 2021 . https://doi.org/10.1007/s13222- 021-00373-z.

[4] T.C. Rakow , H. Faeskorn-Woyke : Digitale Lehre im Fach Datenbanken . In: Meyer, H., et al.: BTW 2019 - Workshopband , S. 97 - 98 . Gesellschaft für Informatik, Bonn. https://doi.org/10.18420/btw2019-ws-09.

[5] T.C. Rakow , M. Focken: EILD.nrw - Die Evaluation von Lehrinhalten im Fach Datenbanken . In: M. Wojciechowski.: Forschungsreport 2021 , S. 138 - 139 . https://doi.org/10.20385/opus4- 3648 .

[6] ORCA.nrw - Studium und Lehre digital unterstützt . https://orca.nrw. Access August 16 , 2022 .

[7] EILD.nrw GitHub repository https://github.com/EILD-nrw/.