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ERIC Number: EJ1443339
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2024
Pages: 20
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1049-4820
EISSN: EISSN-1744-5191
Examining Middle School Students' Attitudes toward Computing after Participating in a Physical Computing Unit
Tyler S. Love
Interactive Learning Environments, v32 n8 p3948-3967 2024
Providing greater access to computer science (CS) education for K-12 students in the United States (U.S.) has increased interest in integrating CS concepts within authentic science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) contexts. Physical computing is one method that has demonstrated promising results in other countries (e.g. England) and has been receiving growing attention in the U.S., yet there remains limited research on physical computing within the U.S. Therefore, this study utilized a modified version of the Computing Attitude Questionnaire (Yadav, A., Mayfield, C., Zhou, N., Hambrusch, S., & Korb, J. T. (2014). Computational thinking in elementary and secondary teacher education. "ACM Transactions on Computing Education", 14(1), 1-16) to examine changes in 71 middle school students' attitudes toward computing after participating in a four-week physical computing unit. Students reported significant gains in all five computing attitude constructs (definition, comfort, interest, classroom applications, and career/future use). Further analyses revealed male students had significantly greater gains than females in the career/future use construct, and there were no significant differences when controlling for completion of prior engineering design coursework (PEDC). Additionally, while the majority (77%) of students indicated they preferred physical computing over screen-based experiences for future computing lessons, analyses found gender and PEDC were not significant predictors of students' preference for learning computing concepts. This study provides implications for improving computer science instruction within authentic STEM contexts.
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Junior High Schools; Middle Schools; Secondary Education; Elementary Education; Grade 7
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A