Learning computer science concepts with Scratch

Scratch is a visual programming environment that is widely used by young people. We investigated if Scratch can be used to teach concepts of computer science (CS). We developed learning materials for middle-school students that were designed according to the constructionist philosophy of Scratch and evaluated them in a few schools during two years. Tests were constructed based upon a novel combination of the revised Bloom taxonomy and the Structure of the Observed Learning Outcome taxonomy. These instruments were augmented with qualitative tools, such as observations and interviews. The results showed that students could successfully learn important concepts of CS, although there were problems with some concepts such as repeated execution, variables, and concurrency. We believe that these problems can be overcome by modifications to the teaching process that we suggest.     

Making Connections: Linking Cognitive Psychology and Intervention Research to Improve Comprehension of Struggling Readers

Many studies have demonstrated the efficacy of reading comprehension interventions for struggling readers, including students with learning disabilities. Yet, some readers continue to struggle with comprehension despite receiving these interventions. In this article, we argue that an explicit link between cognitive psychology and intervention research contributes to knowledge regarding for whom and under what conditions reading comprehension interventions are most likely to be beneficial. First, we provide a brief overview of a cognitive perspective on reading comprehension. Next, we illustrate an application of this perspective by describing a collaborative project in which we examined interactions among reader characteristics, text properties, and instructional contexts. Last, we highlight directions for future research and implications for practice.     

Evidence‐Based Strategies for Reading Instruction of Older Students with Learning Disabilities

Over a quarter of 8th‐grade students and more than one‐third of 4th graders do not read well enough to understand important concepts and acquire new knowledge from grade‐level text. For students with learning disabilities, the numbers are more troubling. This article describes features of evidence‐based instruction for students who continue to struggle with reading in late elementary, middle, and high school. Recommendations are organized into 5 areas that are critical to the reading improvement of older struggling readers: (1) word study, (2) fluency, (3) vocabulary, (4) comprehension, and (5) motivation. Much of the content in this article reflects our efforts with the Special Education and Reading Strands at the National Center on Instruction, funded by the Office of Special Education Programs and the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education. Two reports, both available at http://www.centeroninstruction.org/ , have particular relevance—Interventions for Adolescent Struggling Readers: A Meta‐Analysis with Implications for Practice and Academic Literacy Instruction for Adolescents: A Guidance Document from the Center on Instruction.     

The Efficacy of Multimedia Modules for Teaching Basic Literacy-Related Concepts

Researchers have found that teacher preparation programs are not universally preparing teacher candidates in concepts associated with the alphabetic principle. Yet, the majority of students with reading disabilities or who struggle with beginning reading have difficulty with phonology and concepts associated with the alphabetic principle. The purpose of this study was to examine the efficacy of a series of multimedia modules on participants' (N = 76) knowledge and skills related to early reading instruction. The multimedia modules covered basic literacy concepts primarily related to phonology and phonics. Results from the experimental, control-group design indicated that the modules were successful in teaching foundational literacy constructs to participants. Thus, multimedia modules may be a promising avenue for providing instruction for teacher candidates. Additional research, however, is needed to ensure mastery of knowledge and to evaluate how principles of effective instruction can guide multimedia module use by teacher educators.     

The effectiveness of using incorrect examples to support learning about decimal magnitude

Comparing common mathematical errors to correct examples may facilitate learning, even for students with limited prior domain knowledge. We examined whether studying incorrect and correct examples was more effective than studying two correct examples across prior knowledge levels. Fourth- and fifth-grade students (N = 74) learned about decimal magnitude in a brief tutoring session. Students were randomly assigned to two conditions: 1) comparing correct and incorrect examples (incorrect condition) or 2) comparing correct examples only (correct condition). The incorrect condition helped students learn correct procedures and key concepts more than the correct condition, including reducing misconceptions. Students’ prior knowledge of decimals did not interact with condition. Students’ explanations during the intervention revealed that those in the incorrect condition more frequently discussed correct concepts (e.g., the magnitude of a decimal and identifying misconceptions). Overall, contrasting incorrect examples with correct examples can help students learn correct concepts and procedures.     

Preparing a Data Scientist: A Pedagogic Experience in Designing a Big Data Analytics Course

In this article, we present an experiential perspective on how a big data analytics course was designed and delivered to students at a major Midwestern university. In reference to the MSIS 2006 Model Curriculum, we designed this course as a level 2 course, with prerequisites in databases, computer programming, statistics, and data mining. Students in the class were mostly seniors or at the graduate level, and had a strong technical and quantitative background. We include details of concepts covered in the course, as well as summaries of four major sample course assignments used. Some of the concepts covered include large‐scale data collection and management using the Hadoop ecosystem, stream mining, visual analytics, and social network analytics. Besides Hadoop, the course also introduced various IBM and Teradata big data tools. We show how the course modules align with the intended learning goals and course objectives. A post‐course survey indicated that the structure and organization of the course helped students clearly and concisely assimilate the course content.     

Concepts before coding: non-programming interactives to advance learning of introductory programming concepts in middle school

ABSTRACT

Background and Context: Learners struggle with conceptual understanding of introductory programming concepts such as variables, expressions, and loops.

Objective: We examine whether and how designed activities for conceptual exploration support preliminary engagement with and learning of foundational and often hard-to-grasp programming concepts for students in grades 6–8.

Method: Drawing on principles from dynamic mathematics, we developed a suite of non-programming digital and unplugged activities embedded in a curriculum before students engage in Scratch block-based programming. We conducted empirical research in three middle school classrooms in diverse urban US schools and examined student performance through mixed qualitative and quantitative methods.

Findings: Learning gains were significant and not predicted by grade, gender or prior academic preparation. Free-choice projects of students showed statistically greater (correct) use of key concepts compared to those not in the study.

Implications: Our work demonstrates the promise of novel approaches such as interactive non-programming activities for deeper understanding of programming concepts.     

‘Getting stuck’ in analogue electronics: threshold concepts as an explanatory model

Could the challenge of mastering threshold concepts be a potential factor that influences a student's decision to continue in electronics engineering? This was the question that led to a collaborative research project between educational researchers and the Faculty of Engineering in a New Zealand university. This paper deals exclusively with the qualitative data from this project, which was designed to investigate the high attrition rate of students taking introductory electronics in a New Zealand university. The affordances of the various teaching opportunities and the barriers that students perceived are examined in the light of recent international research in the area of threshold concepts and transformational learning. Suggestions are made to help students move forward in their thinking, without compromising the need for maintaining the element of intellectual uncertainty that is crucial for tertiary teaching. The issue of the timing of assessments as a measure of conceptual development or the crossing of thresholds is raised.     

The Ako Conceptual Framework: toward a culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogy

ABSTRACT

This article offers a new model, the Ako Conceptual Framework (ACF), as a theoretical proposition to add to the critical discourse and development of culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogies within the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. By drawing on the socio-cultural theory and the concept of Zone of Proximal Development, the ACF conceptualises the intersection of culture and pedagogy using a Tongan epistemology. The ACF positions the vā (a space that is relational which enables authentic relationships to be established, nurtured and maintained) and tauhi vaha`a/vā (a responsibility that teachers, schools, educational leaders and practitioners have to establish, nurture and maintain authentic relationships) as the fundamental concepts in the development of culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogies. It is theorised that by recognising Tongan strengths-based principles, values and educational concepts, the taumu`a `oe ako (the purpose for teaching and learning), founga ako (the concepts of teaching), and feinga ako (the concepts of learning) can be aligned. Thereby, recognising and acknowledging the various knowledge systems that the students from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds arrive at school with. The concepts and implications of the ACF are discussed in this article.     

Post-qualitative line of flight and the confabulative conversation: a methodological ethnography

This paper is a methodological ethnography aiming to highlight the difficulties in using conventional methods in connection with an explorative philosophy; Deleuze and Guattari’s. Taking an empirical point of departure in conversations about the future with students in upper secondary school, the struggle to find a scientifically valid label through the focus group interview is outlined. However, combining the particular philosophy with a conventional qualitative method turned out to be an impossible aim since the ideals of the focus group interview departures in the image of stable subject simultaneously as the method is blemished by positivistic language and standards. By turning to post-qualitative research, which encourages new concepts and methods, the confabulative conversation was produced. Within these confabulative conversations, the aim has been to create a methodologically smooth space in order to enable movements beyond manifested knowledge in favor of the virtual and the not-yet-seen, and thus producing possibilities for something new.     

Diversity of occupational orientations in Sales vocational education and training

The article examines the ways students in the school-based part of the vocational education and training (VET) in Sales begin to make sense of the world of work they are about to enter. Drawing on a qualitative study of upper-secondary Sales VET students in Norway, a four-fold typology of orientations to retail work is analysed: first, the disoriented Drifter who is restless and eager to move on to other activities or drifts on to retail apprenticeship without developing any substantial interest; second, the product-oriented Consumer is driven by a strong personal interest in the line of products, for example fashion, music, cars or electronics, and the sense of lifestyle they convey; third, the service-oriented Professional reasons on the basis of satisfaction deriving from the act of providing service to customers; and fourth, the career-oriented Aspirer who is motivated by career advancement opportunities within the retail sector. The article aimed to extend understandings of the initial process of becoming by elucidating the students’ subjective accounts of their diverse paths into retail work within the weakly established Sales education, approaching a labour market sector depicted in terms of low-skill and high turnover.     

Making as worlding: young children composing change through speculative design

A pedagogical perspective for rendering ways of knowing, being and being known, making and the larger maker movement are shaping contemporary educational places, practices and discourses. Despite these advances, its intersection with early literacy and childhood education are nascent. Thinking with theories of multiliteracies and speculative design, this article puts forth a making as worlding analytic frame for literacy research and practice. In doing so, we examine how two young children operate as speculative designers working towards possible, not solely plausible or preferable futures. Drawing on data from a multi‐sited study exploring making in early childhood settings, this article charts how early years and primary students used the contemporary affordances of analogue and immersive technologies to ‘make' a difference. Findings suggest that making provided opportunities not only for re‐storying realities but speculative worldbuilding encouraging young people to participate and problematise present realities.     

Beyond Textbook Instruction: Stories from ELT Teachers in Oman

ABSTRACT

The government of the Sultanate of Oman actively promotes the value of English as a global lingua franca to support modernization and national economic growth. This policy, however, creates difficulties for many teachers, who find themselves implementing certain practices that conflict with a vision of English language teaching (ELT) that accords with humanist values. They find themselves adopting forms of instruction that reduce English to a matter of drills and skills. This essay draws on an inquiry that I facilitated with the help of four Student Teachers during their practicum. The inquiry involved asking them to keep reflective journals in an effort to place their teaching in a critical perspective exposing the contradictory nature of their professional situation. The journals show their struggle with the ELT status quo at their cooperating schools, while revealing their commitment to opening up educational opportunities for their students beyond what the curriculum prescribes.     

Putting threshold concepts to work in health sciences: insights for curriculum design from a qualitative research synthesis

The idea of threshold concepts (TC) has been well received across the higher education community. However the concept’s framework is still evolving and the literature uses the framework in different ways. Just over a decade since the idea first captured interest, it is opportune to explore the nature of that discourse, and the kinds of enquiry undertaken to date. This article reports on a qualitative synthesis that analyses published research on TC in health sciences. It provides a fresh perspective on the literature to identify key themes. Inducting students into complex practices; beyond concepts and developing students’ agency, are the three themes to arise from our findings. These themes offer insights on the ways TC have been used to develop scholarly curriculum, teaching and learning practices. They not only reflect the concerns of the community, but represent a set of empirically based principles for curriculum and course design.     

Genetics Reasoning with Multiple External Representations

This paper explores a case study of a class of Year 10 students (n=24) whose learning of genetics involved activities of BioLogica, a computer program that features multiple external representations (MERs). MERs can be verbal/textual, visual-graphical, or in other formats. Researchers claim that the functions of MERs in supporting student learning are to complement information or processes, to constrain the interpretation of abstract concepts, and to construct new viable conceptions. Over decades, research has shown that genetics remains linguistically and conceptually difficult for high school students. This case study using data from multiple sources enabled students' development of genetics reasoning to be interpreted from an epistemological perspective. Pretest-posttest comparison after six weeks showed that most of the students (n=20) had improved their genetics reasoning but only for easier reasoning types. Findings indicated that the MERs in BioLogica contributed to students' development of genetics reasoning by engendering their motivation and interest but only when students were mindful in their learning. Based on triangulation of data from multiple sources, MERs in BioLogica appeared to support learning largely by constraining students' interpretation of phenomena of genetics.     

Excellence for All: A Nietzschean-inspired approach in professional higher education

Europe’s objectives of economic growth and job creation require large numbers of professionals who are willing and able to innovate and rise above themselves. In this article, a concept of excellence is developed that can be broadly applied in professional higher education. This concept of excellence derives from three concepts which the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche developed in The Gay Science (2001/1887): self-transcendence, self-control and self-styling. By starting with Nietzsche’s radical thoughts, the author aims to grasp the probabilities and challenges of preparing all students for their professional future. Several proposals for educational practice are outlined based on this perspective of ‘excellence for all’.     

Canadian University Rankings: Buyer Beware Once Again

We present a data-based perspective concerning recent (e.g., 2008) Maclean’s magazine rankings of Canadian universities, including cluster analysis of the 2008 data. Canadian universities empirically resemble and relate to each other in a manner different from their formal classification and final rank ordering in the Maclean’s system. Several pitfalls in ranking procedures, related to invalid and unreliable relationships among indices underlying the final ranks, are outlined, along with relevant findings from previous studies. In their present format, although they have become increasingly publicized and promoted, data based on the Maclean’s system can seemingly be of only limited practical use to students. Perhaps more important, in our opinion, ranking exercises have unintended though potentially serious consequences for the intellectual and personal well-being of students.     

Middle school students’ learning of mechanics concepts through engagement in different sequences of physical and virtual experiments

ABSTRACT

Physical and virtual experimentation are thought to have different affordances for supporting students’ learning. Research investigating the use of physical and virtual experiments to support students’ learning has identified a variety of, sometimes conflicting, outcomes. Unanswered questions remain about how physical and virtual experiments may impact students’ learning and for which contexts and content areas they may be most effective. Using a quasi-experimental design, we examined eighth grade students’ (N?=?100) learning of physics concepts related to pulleys depending on the sequence of physical and virtual labs they engaged in. Five classes of students were assigned to either the: physical first condition (PF) (n?=?55), where students performed a physical pulley experiment and then performed the same experiment virtually, or virtual first condition (VF) (n?=?45), with the opposite sequence. Repeated measures ANOVA’s were conducted to examine how physical and virtual labs impacted students’ learning of specific physics concepts. While we did not find clear-cut support that one sequence was better, we did find evidence that participating in virtual experiments may be more beneficial for learning certain physics concepts, such as work and mechanical advantage. Our findings support the idea that if time or physical materials are limited, using virtual experiments may help students understand work and mechanical advantage.     

Reflections on the Dilemmas and Tensions in Mathematics Education Courses for Student Teachers

The paper outlines the dilemmas and paradoxes faced by lecturers and student teachers as they interact in a mathematics education subject that deals with both mathematics as a discipline and as a language, and with appropriate pedagogies for the teaching and learning of mathematics in primary schools. For the lecturer there is a tension between comforting and challenging the students. Are they to be wooed into a more positive attitude to mathematics, at the cost of avoiding the complexity of the discipline; or are they to be challenged by the unique character of mathematics, at the risk of alienation and exclusion? The latter often returns students to their original perception of maths as a harsh and unforgiving subject which is beyond their capabilities as they struggle with unfamiliar concepts and the discomfort of ‘not knowing’. For student teachers there is, paradoxically, a desire to ‘instil understanding’ when they themselves may not fully understand. They often idealise what is good practice but deny it in their own learning.     

Teacher students’ dilemmas when teaching science through inquiry

Background: Inquiry-based science education (IBSE) is suitable to teach scientific contents as well as to foster scientific skills. Similar conclusions are drawn by studies with respect to scientific literacy, motivational aspects, vocabulary knowledge, conceptual understandings, critical thinking, and attitudes toward science. Nevertheless, IBSE is rarely adopted in schools. Often barriers for teachers account for this lack, with the result that even good teachers struggle to teach science as inquiry. More importantly, studies indicate that several barriers and constraints could be ascribed to problems teacher students have at the university stage.

Purpose: The purpose of this explorative investigation is to examine the problems teacher students have when teaching science through inquiry. In order to draw a holistic picture of these problems, we identified problems from three different points of view leading to the research question: What problems regarding IBSE do teacher students have from an objective, a subjective, and a self-reflective perspective?

Design &; method: Using video analysis and observation tools as well as qualitative content analysis and open questionnaires we identified problems from each perspective.

Results: The objectively stated problems comprise the lack of essential features of IBSE especially concerning ‘Supporting pupils’ own investigations’ and ‘Guiding analysis and conclusions.’ The subjectively perceived problems comprise concerns about ‘Teachers’ abilities’ and ‘Pupils’ abilities,’ ‘Differentiated instruction’ and institutional frame ‘Conditions’ while the self-reflectively noticed problems mainly comprise concerns about ‘Allowing inquiry,’ ‘Instructional Aspects,’ and ‘Pupils’ behavior.’

Conclusions: Each of the three different perspectives provides plenty of problems, partially overlapping, partially complementing one another, and partially revealing completely new problems. Consequently, teacher educators have to consider these three perspectives.