Advancing Object-Oriented Model-Driven Software Engineering Pedagogy

There are a number of textbooks and articles on software engineering pedagogy, with each demonstrating sets of common phases and sequence of activities. Many of these textbooks lack a description of the process and purpose for transition from the content of one chapter to the next. Another drawback to using the many available textbooks is the absence of a comprehensive overview of a defined framework and methodology for applying the content of the textbooks. In presenting another article on software engineering pedagogy there is an attempt to differentiate the work herein from existing work, by addressing the aforementioned perceived deficiencies in existing works of this kind. This is accomplished by incorporating international standards in structuring a strong model-driven software engineering framework and methodology for tertiary education that may be used as a complement to existing publications in software engineering pedagogy. The work presented herein documents the effort over a number of years, in developing a rigorous model-driven software development life cycle for the tertiary classroom.

I. Introduction

A search for “software engineering” (SE) books, on the Amazon website produces a list of over 20,000 items. Listed among these are “The Essentials of Modern Software Engineering: Free the Practices from the Method Prisons!” [1], “ISE Software Engineering: A Practitioner’s Approach” [2], “Software Engineering: Theory and Practice” [3], “Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge (SWEBOK) [4], “Software Engineering” [5] Applying UML and Patterns: An Introduction to Object-Oriented Analysis and Design and Iterative Development [6]. These six textbooks represent some of the most comprehensive coverage of software engineering teaching material available today. They have all gone through multiple editions, indicative of evolution and refinement of the content; this is with the exception of Ivar Jacobson [1], which presents a new, first edition, transformational approach to the teaching and industrial practice of software engineering. ¹

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