A Descriptive and Explorative Case Study of a Scratch Programming Experience Involving the Creation of a Lunar Simulation/Model with Grade Six Learners
Abstract
This mixed methods descriptive and exploratory case study examined the experiences of two classes in an elementary school (39 students) using the Scratch programming language to create a lunar simulation of the Earth/Moon System over six days. Using the Computational Thinking Framework developed by Brennan and Resnick (2012) the researcher examined the computational thinking (CT) concepts and practices students were exposed to. This study finds that all of the student groups experienced at least partial success in building their simulation. The researcher found that all of the groups explored the CT concepts of sequence, events, parallelism, conditionals and operators while building their simulation and more than 80% of the groups used data and loops. There is evidence that the students were involved in three of the computational practices: incremental and iterative, testing and debugging and, abstracting and modularizing. This study offers recommendations for practice and for future research.
Description
Keywords
Education--Elementary, Education--Sciences, Education--Technology
Citation
Martin, S. (2016). A Descriptive and Explorative Case Study of a Scratch Programming Experience Involving the Creation of a Lunar Simulation/Model with Grade Six Learners (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/24707