Teaching Computational Thinking in Early Childhood Education With Robotics: The Role of Scaffolding and Gender

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 18
  In Roundtable Session: Technology as an Agent for Change in Early Childhood Education

Abstract

A large body of literature emphasizes the importance of teaching computational thinking skills in preschool education. Nonetheless, the factors related to how young children develop computational thinking are yet to be fully investigated. Accordingly, the study herein investigated the impact of scaffolding and gender in teaching computational thinking skills to young children. The results indicated that boys outperformed girls in computational thinking performance, and that students in both scaffolding groups outperformed the students in the Control group. The results also showed that students in the Modeling-Based Scaffolding Strategy Group outperformed those in the Code Structure-Based Scaffolding Group indicating the superiority of scaffolds that involve kinesthetic spatially oriented, and manipulative-based activities over scaffolds supporting reading and writing collaborative tasks.

Authors

• Kyriakoula Georgiou, University of Cyprus

• Charoula M. Angeli, University of Cyprus