Building Capacity Together: Faculty Co-Learning Computational Storytelling With Early Childhood Preservice Teachers (Poster 4)

• In Event: Expansive Framings of “Capacity Building” in Computing Education: Agency, Infrastructuring, and Advocacy

Abstract

Summary
The study features a synchronous course pilot on computational storytelling that a teacher educator enacted with a group of early childhood preservice teachers at an urban public university. Drawing on sociocultural theories, the study examines the collective learning-to-code and coding-to-learn practices of the faculty member and 20 preservice teachers as part of an undergraduate literacy methods course. Findings of the study indicate how it was necessary for the teacher educator and her preservice teachers to build capacity together – to learn with/from each other through community practices of co-inquiry, co-tinkering, and co-creation via Scratch and ScratchJr. Findings point to the need for teacher educators to include preservice teachers in co-developing culturally-sustaining computing practices in integrating computational literacy in the college classroom.

Objectives and Significance
Recent empirical research begins to inform how computational practices help expand K-12 curricular spaces for multimodal and multilingual learning (Ascenzi-Moreno, Güílamo, Vogel, 2020) as well as cultivate preservice and in-service teachers’ computational thinking (Kong & Lai, 2022). However, little research has been conducted on the intersection of computational integration and teacher education (Kafai & Proctor, 2022), in the context of a need for more equitable literacy and computing education in the higher education classroom. Thus, the study is designed to answer the following research questions: How did a faculty member and a group of pre-service early childhood teachers take up computational literacy together in a course? How did they co-develop learning presence in making meaning for teaching and learning?

Theoretical Framework
The study draws on sociocultural theories of multimodality and digital literacies (Lankshear & Knobel, 2008; Kress & van Leeuwen, 2001; Siegel, 2006) to illuminate the dynamic and culturally varied quality of coding practices of participants. The sociocultural perspective views literacy as situated practices (Street, 1997) and meaning-making as multimodal symbol-making across a multiplicity of semiotic modes (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2001; Siegel, 2006); digital literacies represent situated practices mediated by digital symbolic resources (Lankshear & Knobel, 2008). The framework provides theoretical constructs and analytical tools for the study.

Data and Methods
The study was conducted in fall 2022 as part of an undergraduate literacy methods course, participated by one faculty and 20 female teacher candidates from diverse racial, ethnic, linguistic, and technological backgrounds. The collected data included: (1) synchronous observation; (2) coursework resources; (3) digital artifacts collection; and (4) lesson plans and reflective journals. Data analysis features a recursive, layered process (Strauss & Corbin, 1990), followed by re-applying the theoretical constructs of the study to analyze the data.

Results
Findings demonstrate a co-learning community consisting of the teacher educator and her preservice teachers afforded by computational storytelling. The collective experiences reveal how preservice teachers’ coding inquiries helped inform each other’s learning as well as shape the teacher educator’s knowledge and design of coding events in class. Findings further indicate pre-service teachers’ different levels of positive acceptance and culturally-relevant/sustaining practices through their coded stories for teaching, pointing to the need for teacher educators and preservice teachers to co-develop explicit culturally-sustaining computing for multicultural and multilingual literacy learning in the college classroom.

Author

• Ting Yuan, College of Staten Island - CUNY