Programming for prospective educators (using Scratch)
| unit 1 → | unit 2 → | unit 3 → | unit 4 → |
Introduction
This course has been developed for students of Swiss specialised upper secondary schools in the occupational field of education (=pedagogy), subsequently abbreviated as «SSC-P».
The course comprises four units of 2 lessons each. For each unit, instructions are available for the students and a handout for the teacher. In addition, the templates and sample solutions for the programming tasks are published in studio ITBO Programming on the Scratch portal.
unit 1
In unit 1, the students will get to know the programming environment of Scratch and the basics of programming by means of a sample project. They will implement a matchstick puzzle (model construction). Without too many theoretical considerations, the students will learn basic concepts of "professional" programming (object and event orientation, process communication). Additionally, the students will get acquainted with a Scratch-extension (text-to-speech).
- The students get to know the Scratch programming environment and how to use it in order to create and manage their own programming projects.
- They learn the basic elements of the Scratch programming language and use them to "write" their first simple programs.
- The students reflect on their experiences with programming.
- They also learn (without too many theoretical considerations) basic concepts of "professional" programming (object and event orientation, process communication).
unit 2
Unit 2 focuses on the concept of turtle graphics and the use of Scratch in primary school. Using the example of "properties of regular polygons", the students can experience exploratory learning with turtle graphics for themselves. In addition, the students learn about and apply the essential "basic building blocks" of programs (sequence, repetition, conditional execution, variables).
- The students get more familiar with Scratch.
- They learn about and apply the "basic building blocks" of programs (sequence, repetition, conditional execution, variables).
- The students understand the concept of turtle graphics for the exploratory learning in primary school.
- They deal with the programming of turtle graphics by means of a concrete example.
unit 3
Unit 3 introduces the students to the design and programming of multimedia stories / animations in Scratch.
- The students analyse a simple interactive, multimedia "story". They complete the "story" with an additional scene.
- The students learn how to design and create "scenes" and "scene changes".
- They learn how to design and implement animations.
unit 4
In unit 4, the students deal with the simulation of a robotic lawnmower. They rely on the block concept, which makes their work much easier and provides a clearer outline of the program. Using this example, the students reflect on the problem of the determinacy and correctness of programmed solutions to problems.
- The students understand a simulation as a way of searching a solution for a problem.
- They analyse and test the provided example of the simulation of a robotic lawnmower.
- The students supplement the simulation example with an algorithm that they develop on their own.
- They understand the block concept as a means to outline programs clearly.
External devices or systems (e.g. LEGO Mindstorm) were not taken into account. Such devices and systems are a matter of a robotics course.
"Data structures" are not sufficiently covered in this programming course. This is a shortcoming inherent in many instructions on how to learn programming. However, the given time budget of 8 lessons does not allow the topic of "data structures" to be dealt with adequately. It would make sense to discuss "data structures" in the context of social media. The students would then be able to recognise the importance and functioning of modern, networked data structures (linked data) and understand why companies are so interested in social media.
Teaching process
The students will bring different levels of prior knowledge to the course and show different levels of interest in programming. Some students will declare that they already know how to program. Others will be sceptical about whether they will ever learn it and whether they need it at all.
If the high expectations of programming in school (... logical and critical thinking, creativity, teamwork, ...) are to be fulfilled, the students must deal with the contents of the programming course in their own way.
There are instructions for each unit (student editions), with which the students can work independently in groups (ideally in pairs, if necessary in groups of three). This gives the teacher time to deal more intensively with the students who already have experience or are sceptical about programming. For this purpose, teachers have an accompanying document for each unit (teacher edition). Supporting the sceptical students in such a way that they experience their reservations as an encouragement, and motivating the experienced students to (self-)critically examine the contents of selected units would be desirable goals.
A formative evaluation of the learning outcomes does not make sense in this context. Conversely, a collaborative text editor (e.g. https://edupad.ch) would enable the students to continuously note down and discuss their questions / comments and reflections on the tasks . If necessary, the teacher might require all students to contribute at least three relevant questions and/or comments.
Time requirement
The time required for the four units is 2 lessons for each. Units 1 and 2 form a single lesson; depending on the class, they may take a little more time to complete. In that case, unit 4 might have to be omitted.
Material and sample solutions
The documents for the programming course (teacher editions, student editions) are freely accessible on the ZUM-Server (Zentrale für Unterrichtsmedien): Programming for prospective educators (using Scratch).
The templates and sample solutions to the tasks are published as projects on the Scratch platform in the studio ITBO Programming.
Disposition
Why should future teachers learn how to program?
Programming is an activity that results in a computer program. The fascinating thing about it is the variety of different tasks that can be solved with such programs.
There are numerous sources that provide answers to the question why children should learn to program. E.g. "Programming [is] as important as writing and reading.", "Every child should [...] have programmed once in his school career. Through programming, children acquire important skills for the future, such as creative and critical thinking, teamwork and much more.", "Programming is fun, promotes logical thinking, strengthens creativity and the ‹we-feeling›."
Beat Döbeli Honegger (Department of Media and Computer Science at the Lucerne University of Teacher Education) gives a more differentiated answer in his article "Warum Informatik in der Schule?" by declaring computer science as part of general education with nine arguments ( Warum Informatik in der Schule?):
- Argument 1: constructionism ("The computer as a pupil")
- Argument 2: science ("Computer science belongs to general education since computer science has brought a third pillar to science through simulation.")
- Argument 3: object of thought ("The computer as an object of thought")
- Argument 4: problem solving ("Knowlegde about computer science also helps to solve problems outside of computer science.")
- Argument 5: explanation of the world ("In order to understand and explain today's information society, knowledge of computer science is necessary.")
- Argument 6: conceptual knowledge ("Knowledge of computer science helps to better understand the use of ICT.")
- Argument 7: work technique ("Computer science can be used to practice precise planning, working, and communicating as part of a team.")
- Argument 8: motivation/interest ("With computer science, students interested in technology can be engaged.")
- Argument 9: career choice
Programming is an aspect of computer science. The programming course at SSC-P is limited to the following objectives:
- The students of ‹Specialised Upper Secondary School - Occupational field of education› will later, as primary school teachers, develop their own teaching ideas on how computer programs can support their pupils in learning. Therefore, they should be able to program corresponding apps on their own (e.g., an index of words that the children use in their texts that grows over time; the index promotes the expansion of the vocabulary of the entire class and the weaker primary school pupils can easily "look up" the correct spelling of the words).
- Primary school pupils should be able to use a computer as a tool for exploratory learning in "traditional" subjects such as mathematics, geometry or geography. The turtle graphics approach by Seymour Papert (further developed and updated by Yasmin B. Kafai / Quinn Burke) is well suited for this purpose. The students of ‹Specialised Upper Secondary School› should therefore acquire the concept of Turtle-Graphics, so that they can explain it later to their primary school pupils. As future teachers, they will then be able to set their own tasks that elementary school pupils can solve with turtle graphics.
- The students should also understand how programs and other teaching materials can be published as Open Educational Resources (OER) to make it easier for teachers to prepare and hold lessons. This allows them to use IT applications for contemporary forms of collaboration.
"Suitable" programming environments
Which programming environment is suitable for achieving the objectives mentioned above? Here are some selection criteria that were also decisive for the development of this course.
- The programming environment must be user-friendly so that the students can get familiar with the basics of programming in the short time available for the programming course.
- It must support modern programming concepts (e.g. object and event orientation) so that the students can also master demanding programming projects.
- The programming environment must be usable by primary school pupils. And it must support "turtle-like graphics" (according to the concept of Seymour Papert, 1967, at that time realised with the programming language Logo and turtles as moving objectsKronk, Henry (2019): Seymour Papert LOGO Turtles, and the origin of educational robots.).
- The programming environment must support block-based programming. Text-based programming is not suitable for teaching in primary school.
- Ideally, the programming environment should support the cooperative (further) development of programs.
- The programming environment should already be fairly widespread. With a large user group ("community"), it is more likely that the environment is continuously developed and also adapted to changing educational needs.
- Educational Software should be as widely available as possible and remain so in order to make education accessible to all. Ideally, it should be supported by foundations that are independent of individuals or maintained by public institutions. To prevent it from being monopolised, it should be programmed open source.
A brief description of some well-known programming environments that are used or could be used for educational purposes in German-speaking countries (some of them also in English-speaking countries) can be found in the document Datei:ProgrammingCourseDispositionV2.odt
Selected programming environment: Scratch
The programming environment Scratch is very suitable for achieving the objectives of the programming course at ‹Specialised upper secondary schools - occupational field of education›.
With its support for modern programming concepts (object and event orientation, process communication), Scratch offers an environment that is generally suitable for programming at secondary schools.
Furthermore, Scratch is also specifically suitable for programming with children, especially for exploratory learning with turtle graphics.
Scratch was developed in 2007 and is now used in many schools at different levels. Scratch is free of charge and available in over 70 languages. The Scratch community comprises 42 million project creators. The Scratch Foundation, a non-profit organisation, ensures the long-term availability and further development of Scratch.
There is also a large selection of freely available teaching materials for Scratch. Scratch is web-based. Scratch users can therefore access their projects from any device with an internet connection (including tablets). Users can also exchange projects and further develop them together or individually (remix).
Those who want to use Scratch offline can install the programming environment locally on their own device. The app is available for MS Windows, macOS, ChromeOS and Android (download page). There is no Scratch app for iOS and iPadOS (iPhone and iPad).
Authors: Bruno Wenk, Dieter Burkhard
Translation: Patricia Berchtel
