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Computer Science has been introduced as a new subject in the com- pulsory school curriculum in Switzerland. Research on educational robotics has highlighted potentials of using robots as a hands-on tool to foster computational thinking skills. However, to date these kind of activities are not carried out systematically in schools. To support teachers, a teacher community for educational robotics and computer science education "Roteco" has been established. Teachers can register for free to a digital platform to find classroom-ready activities, news, articles, and information about training and work- shops in their region. Roteco further organizes webinars and events to build the community. Within two years, more than 1,400 teachers have joined the community. In this abstract, we present Roteco, our experiences in establishing the community, platform analytics data as well as a short summary of results from two surveys conducted in 2020 with 87 and in 2021 with 48 teachers. Detailed results can be found in the corresponding journal article [11].

2022

Context With the introduction of computer science (CS) into curricula worldwide, teachers’ adoption of CS-pedagogical content is essential to ensure the long-term success of reform initiatives. Continuing Professional Development (CPD) programs play a key role in this process. Unfortunately, adoption is seldom evaluated in CS-CPDs, or CPDs in general. The result is a dearth of studies i) modelling teachers’ adoption of CS-pedagogical content, or ii) investigating factors influencing the uptake of this new discipline. Both aspects are crucial to design and characterise successful CPD programs. Objectives We thus propose the Teachers’ Adoption of CS (TACS) model to investigate factors influencing the adoption of CS-pedagogical content by teachers who are following a mandatory CS-CPD program. More specifically, the model proposes that contextual factors (e.g. age, gender, and general teaching experience), prior factors (e.g. experience, and CS perception), and acceptance factors (e.g. interest, and self-efficacy) may impact teachers’ adoption of CS-pedagogical content. Methods The study included 180 grade 5-6 teachers (students aged 9-11) that were following a mandatory CS-CPD program. The CS-CPD program involved participation in three day-long sessions distributed over the 2019-2020 academic year. In between sessions, with the support of instructional coaches in the schools, teachers were encouraged, but not required, to adopt the CS-pedagogical content. Therefore, during the CPD, and employing surveys based on the TACS model, we evaluated teachers’ adoption of the proposed content and investigated how the different factors influenced it. Results At the PD-level, the results indicate that self-efficacy and interest queried during the CS-CPD are indicative of CS-pedagogical content adoption. To shed more light on the relationship between these metrics, a more in-depth analysis was conducted with n=92 teachers whose responses could be matched between sessions. While interest relates to how teachers adopt CS-pedagogical content overall, both interest and self-efficacy are necessary to ensure the likelihood of a specific activity being adopted. Finally, individual teacher characteristics appear to impact adoption, with teachers with low ICT experience requiring onboarding, while middle-aged teachers require convincing to adopt CS-pedagogical content. Conclusion Three takeaways emerge from the study. First, the analyses confirm the foundation of the TACS model. Second, the findings establish the key role that interest plays in said model. Finally, the results support the relationship between the contextual, prior and acceptance factors on the adoption of primary school CS-pedagogical content.

2022

How to support teachers to carry out educational robotics activities in school? The case of Roteco, the Swiss robotic teacher community

Sophia Reyes Mury

The development of 21st-century transversal competences such as communication, cooperation, and creativity as well as computational thinking and programming may be aided through educational robotics (ER). Different countries have inserted ER in their school curricula, however, to date ER activities are not carried out systematically in all schools and are more an initiative from single pioneer teachers. In Switzerland, to support all teachers to carry out ER activities and to foster the presence of ER in schools, a robotic teacher community (Roteco) has been created. Teachers may obtain assistance, share experiences, and access instructional resources through a digital platform, which will help them and spread the use of robotics in the classroom. For instance, the site enables educators to simply submit their activities, connect with other educators and professionals, choose and download didactic activities from their peers together with the relevant resources, and stay updated on the newest information, events, research, and further education courses in the field of ER. In the first years of the platform’s existence, already more than 1,400 teachers have joined it. The project and the findings of two surveys are presented in this publication. The first survey was carried out in 2020 with 87 teachers and the second one in 2021 with 48 teachers from the community. The findings highlight the community’s greatest accomplishments as well as the motivations for teachers’ recruitment into the Roteco community and their contributions to its expansion. The results of this project allow for discussion on how to support teachers to implement ER activities in schools in a systematic way.

2022

With the increasing importance of Computational Thinking (CT) at all levels of education, it is essential to have valid and reliable assessments. Currently, there is a lack of such assessments in upper primary school. That is why we present the development and validation of the competent CT test (cCTt), an unplugged CT test targeting 7-9 year-old students. In the first phase, 37 experts evaluated the validity of the cCTt through a survey and focus group. In the second phase, the test was administered to 1519 students. We employed Classical Test Theory, Item Response Theory, and Confirmatory Factor Analysis to assess the instruments' psychometric properties. The expert evaluation indicates that the cCTt shows good face, construct, and content validity. Furthermore, the psychometric analysis of the student data demonstrates adequate reliability, difficulty, and discriminability for the target age groups. Finally, shortened variants of the test are established through Confirmatory Factor Analysis. To conclude, the proposed cCTt is a valid and reliable instrument, for use by researchers and educators alike, which expands the portfolio of validated CT assessments across compulsory education. Future assessments looking at capturing CT in a more exhaustive manner might consider combining the cCTt with other forms of assessments.

2022

A case for co-construction with teachers in curricular reform: Introducing computer science in primary school

Barbara Bruno, Helena Kovacs, Francesco Mondada

With the introduction of Computer Science (CS) into curricula worldwide, researchers have investigated whether CS could be introduced transversally, as a support other disciplines. Few however consider both student learning and the teachers’ perspective in their assessments. In a co-constructive approach to translational research, we collaborated with teachers, in two case studies involving two classes each, to investigate how CS content could be used transversally. More specifically, teacher inputs and student learning data were combined in a mixed methods analysis to determine whether two CS Unplugged (CSU) activities from the curriculum could be leveraged to teach disciplinary content in primary school. The findings indicated that the CSU activities could be leveraged for maths and spelling, but require validation at a larger scale. More important, though, are the takeaways of the co-constructive experience with teachers. Interestingly the benefits of co-construction went both ways. While researchers gained a deeper understanding of the effectiveness of the activities, teachers i) appreciated having detailed student learning analyses, devoid of biases and impressions, ii) changed their perspective about researchers, and iii) were open to other collaborative research initiatives which they found to be drivers of change and innovation in their practice. The way co-construction was approached also impacted the teachers’ perception of their experience. Indeed, while one study was researcher-driven and included teachers, the other was teacher-driven and included researchers. When teacher-driven, the teachers felt they had a more active role, thus reflecting more on the study design, results and implications. Provided the positive impact that co-construction may have on innovation in teacher practices, different co-construction modalities must be investigated, as well as their implications on all stakeholders, including researchers.

ACM2022

Aligning the Design of Educational Robotics Tools With Classroom Activities

Christian Giang, Francesco Mondada, Alberto Piatti

This chapter addresses the alignment of educational robotics (ER) tools with classroom activities. To this end, it first introduces a conceptualization of ER activities describing the relevant cognitive artifacts and the learning theories underlying such activities. Based on this conceptual framework, a set of design and evaluation heuristics are presented, aimed at supporting developers and educators in aligning ER tools with classroom activities and vice versa. The heuristics were elaborated in several focus groups with 35 developers and educators experienced in the domain. To evaluate the methodology in authentic contexts, two case studies with groups of developers will be presented. Moreover, to illustrate the usefulness from an educator's point of view, another example will be presented in which the devised methodology was used to guide the design of an ER classroom activity.

IGI Global2021

Exploring a Handwriting Programming Language for Educational Robots

Barbara Bruno, Christian Giang, Taavet Kangur, Laura Mathex, Francesco Mondada, Vaios Papaspyros

Recently, introducing computer science and educational robots in compulsory education has received increasing attention. However, the use of screens in classrooms is often met with resistance, especially in primary school. To address this issue, this study presents the development of a handwriting-based programming language for educational robots. Aiming to align better with existing classroom practices, it allows students to program a robot by drawing symbols with ordinary pens and paper. Regular smartphones are leveraged to process the hand-drawn instructions using computer vision and machine learning algorithms, and send the commands to the robot for execution. To align with the local computer science curriculum, an appropriate playground and scaffolded learning tasks were designed. The system was evaluated in a preliminary test with eight teachers, developers and educational researchers. While the participants pointed out that some technical aspects could be improved, they also acknowledged the potential of the approach to make computer science education in primary school more accessible.

Springer, Cham2021

The CT-cube: A framework for the design and the assessment of computational thinking activities

Francesco Mondada, Alberto Piatti

Computational thinking is a fundamental competence that is being introduced in K-12 and succeeding curricula worldwide. Despite this huge effort, many computational thinking models in the literature do not explicitly take into consideration the pupils’ age and the developmental nature of computational thinking skills. Furthermore, many existing computational thinking models are focused on the internal thinking processes of the individuals, failing to explicitly consider the situated nature, in terms of social context and artefactual environment, that usually characterise tasks that require computational thinking to be solved. In this paper, we present a framework for the design, realisation, analysis, and assessment of computational thinking activities, called CT-cube. The CT-cube allows to extend existing computational thinking models to consider the life-long development of computational thinking skills in individuals, from childhood to adult age, and to take into consideration the situated nature of computational thinking activities. We use the CT-cube to design an unplugged task, called Cross Array Task (CAT), allowing to assess the algorithmic skills of K-12 pupils and we show how the CT-cube can be used in this case to illustrate the development of this competence along the entire compulsory school path, considering a sample of 109 pupil aged 3 to 16 in Switzerland.

2022

The role of feedback and guidance as intervention methods to foster computational thinking in educational robotics learning activities for primary school

Bernard Baumberger, Evgeniia Bonnet, Christian Giang, Francesco Mondada, Vaios Papaspyros, Jean-Philippe Pellet

Computational thinking (CT) is considered an emerging competence domain linked to 21st-century competences, and educational robotics (ER) is increasingly recognised as a tool to develop CT competences. This is why researchers recommend developing intervention methods adapted to classroom practice and providing explicit guidelines to teachers on integrating ER activities. The present study thus addresses this challenge. Guidance and feedback were considered as critical intervention methods to foster CT competences in ER settings. A between-subjects experiment was conducted with 66 students aged 8 to 9 in the context of a remote collaborative robot programming mission, with four experimental conditions. A two-step strategy was employed to report students' CT competence (their performance and learning process). Firstly, the students' CT learning gains were measured through a pre-post-test design. Secondly, video analysis was used to identify the creative computational problem-solving patterns involved in the experimental condition that had the most favourable impact on the students’ CT scores. Results show that delayed feedback is an effective intervention method for CT development in ER activities. Subject to delayed feedback, students are better at formulating the robot behaviour to be programmed, and, thus, such a strategy reinforces the anticipation process underlying the CT.

2022

Mediating Computational Thinking Through Educational Robotics In Primary School

Morgane Solène Denise Chevalier

Nowadays, computational thinking (CT) is considered a skill to be taught. While educational robotics (ER) appears promising to foster students' CT, operational CT frameworks and explicit guidance in ER are lacking. This thesis thus proposes to understand how teachers can implement ER learning activities in order to develop students' CT competences, and produced two concrete contributions: 1) the creative and computational problem solving (CCPS) model, an operational ER-CT framework that was developed to design ER-CT learning activities, and more specifically the associated intervention and assessment methods, by rendering the CT strategies of students observable. 2) the design and analysis of two complete ER learning activities to promote the full range of CT competences based on the CCPS model, including the artefacts, assessment, and intervention methods.Both were leveraged in a multi-stage process to investigate how to mediate teaching with ER to foster CT. First, 43 teachers following an ER teacher training program were probed regarding their attitude towards ER, which helped identify two distinct profiles of teachers: "pioneers" and "followers". While the former may implement ER and CT on their own, the latter need resources and guidelines to do so. The analysis highlighted the need for ER activities fostering 21st-century skills. The analysis also showed that as long as teachers can benefit from ER training and take the time to appropriate the robotic artefact (i.e. the first stage of instrumentation), teachers' attitude toward ER is positive. However, to pass the second stage of instrumentation and thus organize the conditions for developing the students' CT competence with the robots, ER must be perceived as usable. For this, teachers report needing material resources and time. Since the acceptability of ER is correlated with its usability, work should focus on improving ER usability to increase its acceptability. The next step thus entailed the design and setup of the two complete ER learning activities, which the CCPS model assessed. The intervention methods targeted the introduction of delays in students' thought process, once by preventing access to the programming interface and once by having a delay between execution and the visualization of the results of said execution. Results showed success in fostering students' CT as they went through all the phases involved in the model. Subsequently, an evaluation of teachers' acceptance of the provided learning activities, intervention and assessment methods was conducted with 334 teachers. Indeed, to orchestrate an ER learning activity for CT, the teachers need time and training to carry out the two instrumentation stages. Results showed that while teachers perceived the utility of the methods and resources provided, it was still unclear how the use of the artefacts (usability) related to students' strategies and thus CT competences. Hence, teachers need more time for the second stage of instrumentation. More work must be done, on more extended training periods, to provide explicit guidelines that would help ensure that all teachers and not just pioneers can employ ER to foster CT competences in their classrooms. More explicit guidelines may thus further enable the CCPS model to be a tool for teachers' instrumentation of CT in ER learning activities in terms of design, intervention and assessment.

EPFL2022