Harnessing Hype to Teach Empirical Thinking: An Experience With AI Coding Assistants
This work addresses the problem of making empirical methods more accessible for software engineering students, though it is incremental as it applies an existing educational approach to a new topic.
The study tackled the challenge of teaching empirical thinking to software engineering students by using AI coding assistants as a hype-driven topic, resulting in increased student engagement and development of critical thinking skills through hands-on sessions and student-designed empirical studies.
Software engineering students often struggle to appreciate empirical methods and hypothesis-driven inquiry, especially when taught in theoretical terms. This experience report explores whether grounding empirical learning in hype-driven technologies can make these concepts more accessible and engaging. We conducted a one-semester seminar framed around the currently popular topic of AI coding assistants, which attracted unusually high student interest. The course combined hands-on sessions using AI coding assistants with small, student-designed empirical studies. Classroom observations and survey responses suggest that the hype topic sparked curiosity and critical thinking. Students engaged with the AI coding assistants while questioning their limitations -- developing the kind of empirical thinking needed to assess claims about emerging technologies. Key lessons: (1) Hype-driven topics can lower barriers to abstract concepts like empirical research; (2) authentic hands-on development tasks combined with ownership of inquiry foster critical engagement; and (3) a single seminar can effectively teach both technical and research skills.