Collaborative Research: Scaffolding Pre-service, Early Childhood Teachers to Debug Block-based Programming

以探究的方式让低年级学生接触STEM内容是具有挑战性的。做到这一点的一种方式是让学生与机器人一起参与戏剧表演和其他以学生为中心的幼儿教育方法。编程，以及由此产生的调试，对于控制机器人运动的能力至关重要。它还有助于发展解决问题的技能。在没有一位有能力和自我效能从事调试的老师的帮助下，期望早期年级的学生获得这些技能是不合理的。在这三年的合作研究项目中，这个改进本科生STEM教育(IUSE)探索与设计项目将原型和研究的有效性策略，帮助职前、幼儿教育教师学会调试基于块的编程。通过这样做，该项目有可能邀请绝大多数女性(幼儿教育职前教师)的成员参加计算机科学，而在这个领域，妇女的代表性严重不足。它还有可能对来自低资源环境或少数民族背景的学生的早期年级计算机科学教学产生积极影响-这是一个非常重要的目标，既是社会正义的目标，也是确保未来计算机科学劳动力尽可能广泛的人才库的重要目标。这与NSF的IUSE计划的目标一致，因为该计划旨在加强职前幼儿教师的STEM教育过程和结果，这些教师经常遭受STEM教育准备不足的痛苦。具体项目的目标是(A)确定阻碍职前幼儿教师成功和有效调试的动机和认知挑战的性质，以及(B)将脚手架技术与特定学习者特征相匹配，以促进职前幼儿教师成功和高效的调试。为实现这些目标，项目组将进行5项研究--(1)对妨碍职前幼儿教师成功和有效调试的认知和动机挑战的探索性研究；(2)探索性研究(包括本项目之前的试点研究)和按挑战分组的综合研究；(3)脚手架荟萃分析数据集和脚手架原型策略的数据挖掘；以及(4-5)脚手架原型的实施研究。此外，项目组将通过讲习班和网络研讨会向(A)大学教育工作者传播成果，(B)通过发表同行评议的期刊文章向STEM教育研究人员传播成果。这项重要的工作得到了IUSE计划和罗伯特·诺伊斯教师奖学金计划的资助。

Engaging early grades students with STEM content in an inquiry-oriented manner is challenging. One way in which this can be done is by having students participate with robots in dramatic play and other student-centered approaches to early childhood education. Programming, and, by consequence, debugging, is critical to the ability to control robot movements. It also contributes to the development of problem-solving skills. It is unreasonable to expect early grades students to gain these skills without being helped by a teacher who has the ability and self-efficacy to engage in debugging. In this three year, collaborative research project, this Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) Exploration and Design project will prototype and research the effectiveness of strategies to help pre-service, early childhood education teachers learn to debug block-based programming. In so doing, the project has the potential to invite members of a population that is overwhelmingly female (early childhood education pre-service teachers) to participate in computer science, a field in which women are drastically under-represented. It also has the potential to positively influence the teaching of computer science in the early grades among students who are from low-resourced settings or from ethnic minority backgrounds - a very important goal for both social justice and ensuring the widest possible talent pool for the computer science workforce of the future. This aligns with the goals of NSF's IUSE program in that it seeks to enhance STEM education processes and outcomes among pre-service, early childhood teachers, who often suffer from weak STEM education preparation.The specific project aims are (a) to determine the nature of the motivational and cognitive challenges that impede successful and efficient debugging among pre-service early childhood teachers, and (b) match scaffolding techniques with specific learner characteristics to promote successful and efficient debugging among pre-service early childhood teachers. To address these aims, the project team will engage in 5 studies - (1) an exploratory study of cognitive and motivational challenges that impede successful and efficient debugging among pre-service early childhood teachers, (2) meta-synthesis of exploratory studies (including pilot studies prior to this project) and clusters of participants according to challenges, (3) data mining of a scaffolding meta-analysis dataset and prototyping scaffolding strategies, and (4-5) implementation studies of scaffolding prototypes. Furthermore, the project team will disseminate results to (a) university educators through workshops and webinars, and (b) STEM education researchers through publication of peer-reviewed journal articles. This important work is supported with funding from the IUSE program and the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship program.