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Programming behaviours of primary school students and instructional implications
Author
Lye, Sze Yee
Supervisor
Koh, Joyce Hwee Ling
Abstract
With the possibility of programming fostering computational thinking, programming has attracted considerable attention in the educational field in recent years. Some countries are making programming a compulsory school subject while the non-profit organization, Code.org, has been organizing the yearly Hour of Code every December. To date, more than 100 million students worldwide are involved in the Hour of Code. There is a growing interest in introducing programming to school-going children. Despite this keen interest, a search of the literature revealed there was limited K-12 programming studies that can shed light on their programming behaviours. Such research is particularly valuable for educators and researchers interested in K-12 programming. Thus, this study aims to bridge this gap by examining 14 Primary 4 students involved in a closed programming task in-depth with the use of multicase research design. The data collected included on-screen recordings, interviews, field observation and the students’ final programs. Not only does this study address a research gap, it also contributes to methodology in K-12 programming studies with the use of on-screen recording. On-screen recording involves the recording of their on-screen activities and verbal utterances with software installed in each computing device, and is seldom reported in K-12 programming studies. Such data collection would provide rich information as to how young children are programming. Using these multiple data collection methods and sources, this study provides a narrative of their programming behaviours and the variations in programming behaviours among these students. Based on these findings, a programming model of how young students are programming is proposed. This model can help provide a lens to guide researchers in examining programming behaviours in future research. The programming styles of the different groups and the corresponding instructional strategies that best suit these groups are also suggested. This will provide practical insights for K-12 educators when planning programming lessons.
Date Issued
2018
Call Number
LB1025.3 Lye
Date Submitted
2018