Using real projects as motivators in programming education

It is very hard to properly motivate students to learn abstract programming concepts and programming is generally considered as hard. Students tend to fear programming courses and they develop skeptic attitude towards this kind of courses. One of the key factors that contribute to this kind of attitude is abstract nature of programming and the fact that students do not realize why exactly they should gain such knowledge. In this paper an approach that incorporates using real projects to show students the practical outcomes of their learning process in order to motivate them to learn programming is discussed and initial results of its usage are presented and elaborated.