Summary — What This Chapter Covers
- Programming questions show up in both Paper 1 (tracing/explaining pseudocode) and Paper 2 (writing, testing, refining programs — including a fixed 15-mark question).
- Every answer must be written in CIE pseudocode, Structured English, or a high-level language — never a mix of your own shorthand.
- Before writing any new program, ask yourself 5 key questions: inputs, outputs, processes, constructs, subprograms.
- Trace tables are used to track how variable values change as a program runs, line by line, exactly like a computer would execute it.
- Trace table questions use specific command words (Complete, State, Explain, Identify) that tell you exactly what kind of answer is expected.
- The most common way students lose marks is skipping a line, misreading a condition, or not creating a new row when a variable changes.
1. How to Answer Programming Questions
Here's the thing most students get wrong: they read a programming question, panic slightly because it "looks unfamiliar," and just start typing pseudocode hoping something sticks. That's the wrong approach — and it's exactly why marks get lost even when the student clearly understands the topic.
The examiners aren't testing whether you can memorise a program. They're testing whether you can take a real-world problem, break it into logical pieces, and express those pieces using the tools CIE has given you (sequence, selection, iteration, variables, subprograms). So instead of "starting to type," you start by interrogating the question — like a detective, not a typist.
Where do programming questions appear?
- Paper 1 — tests your ability to read, trace, and explain algorithms and pseudocode. You're not usually writing brand-new programs here — you're interpreting existing ones.
- Paper 2 — tests your ability to design, write, test, and refine programs from scratch, including one guaranteed 15-mark programming question at the end of the paper.
Why this matters
Because the two papers test different skills, your revision strategy should differ too. For Paper 1, practise reading pseudocode fluently — like reading a foreign language you're becoming bilingual in. For Paper 2, practise writing pseudocode from a blank page, which is a completely different muscle.
The language rules — non-negotiable
All programming answers must use one of these three, and only these three:
- CIE pseudocode notation — the standardised syntax defined in the CIE specification (e.g.
← for assignment, IF...THEN...ENDIF for selection)
- Structured English — plain English written in a clearly numbered, logically ordered way (used less often, but valid for some question types)
- A high-level programming language — like Python, if the question specifically allows it
2. How to Answer Trace Table Questions
What actually IS a trace table?
What to Memorise
The 5 Key Questions
Inputs → Outputs → Processes → Constructs → Subprograms. Answer these before writing any new program.