Making Apps: An Approach to Recruiting Youth to Computer Science
Making Apps: An Approach to Recruiting Youth to Computer Science
复制标题
制作应用程序：招募年轻人学习计算机科学的方法
DOI：
10.1145/3425710
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发表时间：
2020
影响因子：
2.4
通讯作者：
Pantic, Katarina
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Clarke-Midura, Jody;Sun, Chongning;Pantic, Katarina
为了满足扩大计算机科学参与的需要，我们设计了一个夏令营，教中学生使用MIT App Inventor编写应用程序。在过去的四个夏天里，我们观察到参加我们的夏令营后，年轻人对计算机科学的兴趣和自我效能感有了显著提高。然而，这些青年中的大多数是来自我们当地社区的青年。为了在全州范围内提供平等的机会并确保更多的多样性，我们有兴趣研究营地对更广泛的青年人口的影响。因此，我们与一个外展计划合作，在西部山区低收入高贫困地区的青年中接触和测试我们的营地。在2019年夏天，我们举办了两组营地：本地广告应用营地，吸引了来自当地社区的年轻人，第二组营地是针对低收入高贫困地区青年的更大外展计划的一部分。两个营地的人员、营地活动、结构和课程设计相同。不过，参与者的背景略有不同。使用调查数据，我们发现，当地的样本经历了显着的增益在自我效能感和兴趣，而外展组只报告了显着的增益在参加夏令营后的自我效能感。然而，从外联参与者那里收集的定性数据表明，他们对营地及其导师都有积极的体验。在这篇文章中，我们讨论了营地的设计和调查结果有关的策略，扩大参与计算机科学教育。
In response to the need to broaden participation in computer science, we designed a summer camp to teach middle-school-aged youth to code apps with MIT App Inventor. For the past four summers, we have observed significant gains in youth's interest and self-efficacy in computer science, after attending our camps. The majority of these youth, however, were youth from our local community. To provide equal access across the state and secure more diversity, we were interested in examining the effect of the camp on a broader population of youth. Thus, we partnered with an outreach program to reach and test our camps on youth from low-income high-poverty areas in the Intermountain West. During the summer of 2019, we conducted two sets of camps: locally advertised app camps that attracted youth from our local community and a second set of camps as part of a larger outreach program for youth from low-income high-poverty areas. The camps for both populations followed the same design of personnel, camp activities, structure, and curriculum. However, the background of the participants was slightly different. Using survey data, we found that the local sample experienced significant gains in both self-efficacy and interest, while the outreach group only reported significant gains in self-efficacy after attending the camp. However, the qualitative data collected from the outreach participants indicated that they had a positive experience both with the camp and their mentors. In this article, we discuss the camp design and findings in relation to strategies for broadening participation in Computer Science education.