ABSTRACT
Many programs offer informal experiences in programming for select students who may qualify or whose parents pay fees for attending. Integrating computational thinking (CT) in the formal classroom setting provides equal opportunities to develop valuable problem-solving skills for all students. However, such integration poses challenges since teachers may have limited experiences in computing and may be pressured by time constraints due to the need to cover Common Core and Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) as well as district specific initiatives. A 2-year intervention has been designed to target upper elementary level self-contained classrooms to increase teachers' knowledge and ability for integrating CT into science lessons. Twenty teachers from four school districts in Southern California participated in the first year of the project's professional development activities. These schools have varying levels of diversity and socioeconomic status of student populations. Instead of using popular drag-and-drop programming tools such as Scratch or Tynker, the first year of the project focused on key CT concepts and helped teachers connect these concepts with skills important for student success in science activities. This paper reports on the study of the project's impact on student learning of key CT concepts among students from project classrooms. The main elements of the professional development are also described.
- Briggs, A., & Snyder, L. (2012). Computer science principles and CS 10K initiative. ACM Inroads, 3(2), 29--31. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Bybee, R. (1997). Achieving Scientific Literacy, Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.Google Scholar
- Cornett, J., & Knight, J. (2008). Research on coaching. In J. Knight (Ed.), Coaching: Approaches and perspectives (pp.192--216). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.Google Scholar
- Donovan, M.S., & Bransford, J.D. (2005). How students learn: Science in the Classroom. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.Google Scholar
- Hayden, K., Ouyang, Y., Scinski, L., Olszewsk, B., and Bielefeldt, T. (2011). Increasing Student Interest and Attitude in STEM: Professional Development and Activities to Engage Learners. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp 47 -- 69Google Scholar
- ISTE/CSTA (2011) Computational Thinking Teacher Resources, 2nd ed. Retrieved from http://iste.org/computational-thinking/Google Scholar
- ISTE, (2016). ISTE Standards for Students. Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/standards/standards /for-students-2016Google Scholar
- Repenning, A., Webb, D. C., Brand, C., Gluck, F., Grover, R. et. al. (2014). Beyond Minecraft: Facilitating computational thinking through modeling and programming in 3D. Computer Graphics and Applications, 34(3), 68--71.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Schofield, E., Erlinger, M., & Dodds, Z. (2014). MyCS: a CS curriculum for middle-years students. Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, 29(4), 145--155. Google ScholarDigital Library
- Wayne, A. J., Kwang, S. Y., Zhu, P., Cronen, S., & Garet, M. S. (2008) "Experimenting with Teacher Professional Development: Motives and Methods", Educational Research, 37(8): 469 -- 479.Google ScholarCross Ref
Index Terms
- Introducing Computational Thinking through Non-Programming Science Activities
Recommendations
Assessing Computational Thinking in CS Unplugged Activities
SIGCSE '17: Proceedings of the 2017 ACM SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science EducationComputer Science (CS) Unplugged activities have been deployed in many informal settings to present computing concepts in an engaging manner. To justify use in the classroom, however, it is critical for activities to have a strong educational component. ...
Teaching how to teach computational thinking
ITiCSE 2018: Proceedings of the 23rd Annual ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science EducationComputational Thinking is argued to be an essential skill for the workforce of the 21st century. As a skill, Computational Thinking should be taught in all schools, employing computational ideas integrated into other disciplines. Up until now, questions ...
Infusing computational thinking into middle grade science classrooms: lessons learned
WiPSCE '18: Proceedings of the 13th Workshop in Primary and Secondary Computing EducationThere is a growing need to present all students with an opportunity to learn computer science and computational thinking (CT) skills during their primary and secondary education. Traditionally, these opportunities are available outside of the core ...
Comments