RUME 28
2026
Alexandria, Virginia
Examining How Students Leverage Code as a Representational Tool in Combinatorics
Page: 1321
In this poster, we explore the role of computing in students’ mathematical reasoning and how students engage with coding modules while solving combinatorics problems. While analyzing paired students’ classroom work, we noticed that students pointed out different aspects of their code in their explanation of how they solved the problems. We seek to answer the following research question: What aspects of the code did students attend to as they used code as a representation in solving combinatorial problems, and how did they leverage these aspects of code? We draw on Lockwood’s model (2013) of combinatorial thinking in connecting aspects of code that represent counting process and sets of outcomes. We found that some of the ways that the code was used to represent their listing process, to represent their counting process, and using the output of the code as a representation.