How do Teachers Apply Computational Thinking Activities in Elementary School? From Continuing Education to the classroom

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: There is no consensus of what skills can be developed from the learning of Computation Thinking (CT). However, teachers and researchers agreed that by the learning of CT individuals can acquire and expand many abilities. Courses have been carried out in Brazil and in other countries with the aim of motivating teachers on adding CT to classroom practices. OBJECTIVE: This article to present a case study that investigated the feasibility of introducing activities of CT for primary school children. Such activities were created and mediated by the teachers of Primary School. METHOD: First, a continuing education course about Computational Thinking was conducted with the participation of 14 teachers. The participants could understand the fundamentals of CT, and consequently, became able to planning and conducting CT activities by themselves in their classrooms. After, we analyzed the data gathered during the course under the quantitative and qualitative lenses. RESULTS: The results showed that the participants had a degree of agreement between 56% and 71% regarding the understanding and applicability of CT to developing skills in Primary School. The qualitative findings revealed that the participants could prepare activities that linked CT to topics presented in the subjects of Primary School. Besides, we could identify three patterns of shaping the activities in which this "computational think" were incorporated. CONCLUSION: Practices to stimulate the CT in students are mediated by using different teaching strategies as such Gamification and Culture Maker. These activities also enable the development of skills related to the National Curricular Common Base