Creating a Virtual Infrastructure for Engaging Rural Youth in STEM Disciplines Through Computer Science

• In Event: Power in the Plurality of Pedagogies and Partnerships in "Computer Science for All"

Abstract

OBJECTIVE
This work brings game-based coding experiences to rural middle school students. The primary environment is the game MineCraft. Students write "mods" that change the operation of the game. These mods are written using a block-based language suitable for beginning programmers. Because the project targets rural students, it is vitally important that the intervention requires no technical staff onsite, be usable on the diverse computational platforms and require no specific administrative rights be granted to students.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Activity Theory, from Vygotsky and Leont’ev, and further refined by Cole (1997) and Engestrom (1999) states that when activities are performed to achieve a specific learning outcome, there are distinct but significant factors that interact to shape the activity (Roschelle, 1998). In the most basic version, the factors are the object (the activity or purpose of the activity) and mediating factors (e.g., tools available to the student). Changes in any one of these factors will alter the relationship between the factors, and thus alter the outcome of the activity. Cole and Engestrom added additional factors such as community, rules and expectations (Roschelle, 1998). In the context of this project, simply providing students with educational software is not enough to ensure their success.

METHODS & DATA
We teamed with ThoughtSTEM in San Diego to modify their LearnToMod system for use with rural Maine youth. LearnToMod is a web-based platform that allows students to create, edit and deploy mods to a personal Minecraft server. Minecraft utilizes a client-server paradigm where all user input and visual output is produced by the client, normally running on the user's local machine. Furthermore, the graphics rendering is done using a local video card. This presented a major challenge to our objective that no administrative rights need be given to students. We developed a solution in which both the server and client were virtualized and accessed through a web browser. Teachers and students completed pre and post surveys, teachers kept journals, and log files were analyzed to assess student time on task and progress.

FINDINGS
The success of the program increased over the three year period in terms of both number of students and teacher engagement. As of May of 2018 16 student groups participated with approximately 200 students and 20 teachers leading groups. Total time students spent in lessons(1000 hours) in 2017-2018 increased 3.35-fold over the previous school year (300 hrs). To date teacher logs indicated that students who were female, at-risk and those with diverse learning abilities particularly benefited from the intervention.

SIGNIFICANCE
The significance of this work is the ability to deliver educational software that normally needs to be installed on a user's machine using nothing but a web browser. This helps level the playing field between the urban and affluent "haves" and the rural "have nots". This delivery method requires no technical support at the school, no specific computational platform in the students' hands, and centralizes all program administration. This allows all students everywhere (with an internet connection) equal access to educational software.

Authors

• Bruce Segee, University of Maine

• Ami Gaspar, University of Maine

• Benjamin Segee, The University of Maine