Enhancing Early Childhood Educators' Knowledge of Computer Science and Engineering Concepts to Spark Young Children's Early Interest in STEM Careers

增强幼儿教育工作者对计算机科学和工程概念的了解，激发幼儿对 STEM 职业的早期兴趣

• 批准号: 2148777
• 负责人: Gisele Ragusa
• 金额: $ 104.28万
• 依托单位: University of Southern California
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-04-01 至 2025-03-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2148777&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Enhancing; Early; Childhood; Educators; Knowledge

High-quality experiences with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in the pre-kindergarten years pave the way for learning about computer science and engineering in K-12 classrooms. Early, high-quality STEM learning experiences are also an essential way to attract more students to STEM course work and STEM careers. Currently however, the number of high-quality STEM education resources and materials available to preschool educators is limited. This 3-year project addresses this gap in teachers’ capacity to support young children’s STEM content knowledge by developing (1) a play-based computer science and pre-engineering education program for pre-K children, (2) a web-based, early childhood teacher workforce development program, and (3) accompanying child and early childhood educator assessments. In designing these elements, the project will follow four principles of early learning: (1) technology-mediated learning and pre-engineering is a natural and critical part of children’s early learning; (2) children’s curiosity about the world around them abounds and their engagement with technology is a powerful catalyst for children’s play; (3) with appropriate guidance and equity in access, children’s natural curiosity becomes the foundation for beginning to use technology-mediated inquiry skills and early problem-solving to explore the surrounding world; and (4) early exploration can be a rich context in which children use and develop important early computer science and pre-engineering skills, including programming, working as a team, communication using “pre-engineering” vocabulary, applied mathematics, and design thinking. Project partners include the University of Southern California’s STEM faculty and four Los Angeles community colleges, all of which are Hispanic-Serving Institutions. A set of Los Angeles-area preschools that serve linguistically and culturally diverse communities will serve as research sites. A total of 30 early childhood education teachers with their 600+ children will participate in the implementation research; matched numbers of children will be recruited for the control condition (1200 children total).The project’s research questions include: (1) In what ways does the project’s infusing of play-based early computer science and pre-engineering into child development programs impact young children’s early computer science and pre-engineering knowledge, and their knowledge of and early interest in STEM careers? (2) What is the relationship between the project’s teacher professional development model and participating teachers’ content knowledge of early computer science and pre-engineering and instructional performance? and (3) What impact does the teachers’ cyber-safety focused professional development have on the cyber-safe practices of participating preschool teachers and their young students? The project will use a modular, web-based, teacher professional development program that allows preschool educators and university STEM faculty to co-create materials and engage in teacher professional development together. In years two and three, the project will test the development, feasibility, and fidelity of its approach using a randomized controlled trial (RCT). The RCT will be scaled annually, beginning with two pilot test sites, and continuing with testing across six large sites by the project's final year. Data to be collected include observation of classroom teaching and children’s behaviors, teacher interviews, teacher focus groups, and parent and teacher surveys. During the 2-year RCT, multivariate analyses will be used to examine whether teachers and children in the intervention group have significantly higher post-test scores than their peers in the control group. The team will regress the post-test scores on a set of control variables (race, gender, socioeconomic status), pre/baseline-test scores, and a variable representing intervention versus control to further examine whether teachers and children in the intervention group have significantly higher post-test scores than teachers and children in the control group. Cross group comparisons will be made. At the end of the project, multilevel hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) will be employed comparing teachers and children in Year 3 of the RCT. The project aims to produce a fully tested set of bilingual, bicultural products for national dissemination. Products would include a fully exportable, web-based, modular early childhood educator STEM workforce training and professional development model which focuses on “junior computer science and pre-engineering” through play. This project is funded by the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program, which supports projects that build understandings of practices, program elements, contexts and processes contributing to increasing students' knowledge and interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and information and communication technology (ICT) careers.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

在幼儿园前几年的科学，技术，工程和数学（STEM）的高质量经验为在K-12教室学习计算机科学和工程铺平了道路。早期，高质量的STEM学习体验也是吸引更多学生参加STEM课程和STEM职业的重要途径。然而，目前，学前教育工作者可获得的高质量STEM教育资源和材料数量有限。这个为期3年的项目通过开发（1）学前儿童基于游戏的计算机科学和工程学前教育计划，（2）基于网络的幼儿教师队伍发展计划，以及（3）伴随儿童和幼儿教育工作者评估，解决了教师支持幼儿STEM内容知识的能力差距。在设计这些元素时，该项目将遵循早期学习的四个原则：（1）以技术为媒介的学习和前期工程是儿童早期学习的自然和关键部分;（2）儿童对周围世界充满好奇心，他们对技术的参与是儿童游戏的强大催化剂;（3）通过适当的指导和平等的机会，儿童天生的好奇心成为开始使用技术中介的探究技能和早期解决问题的能力来探索周围世界的基础;和（4）早期探索可以是一个丰富的背景下，儿童使用和发展重要的早期计算机科学和预工程技能，包括编程，作为一个团队工作，沟通使用“预工程”词汇，应用数学和设计思维。项目合作伙伴包括南加州大学的STEM教师和四所洛杉矶社区学院，所有这些都是西班牙裔服务机构。一组洛杉矶地区的幼儿园，服务于语言和文化多样性的社区将作为研究地点。实施研究对象为30名幼儿教师及其600多名幼儿，对照研究对象为30名幼儿教师及其600多名幼儿（共1200名儿童）。该项目的研究问题包括：（1）该项目以何种方式注入了基于游戏的早期计算机科学和前将工程纳入儿童发展计划会影响幼儿早期的计算机科学和工程前知识，以及他们对STEM职业的知识和早期兴趣？(2)本计画的教师专业发展模式与参与教师的早期电脑科学与工程预备课程知识与教学表现之间有何关系？（3）教师网络安全专业发展对幼儿教师和幼儿学生的网络安全实践有何影响？该项目将使用一个模块化的、基于网络的教师专业发展计划，允许学前教育工作者和大学STEM教师共同创建材料，并共同参与教师专业发展。在第二年和第三年，该项目将使用随机对照试验（RCT）测试其方法的发展，可行性和保真度。随机对照试验将每年进行一次，从两个试点试验点开始，到项目的最后一年，将在六个大型试验点继续进行试验。收集的数据包括课堂教学和儿童行为的观察、教师访谈、教师焦点小组和家长和教师调查。在为期2年的随机对照试验中，将使用多变量分析来检查干预组的教师和儿童是否比对照组的同龄人有显着更高的后测分数。该小组将回归一组控制变量（种族，性别，社会经济地位），前/基线测试分数，和一个变量代表干预与控制，以进一步检查教师和儿童在干预组是否有显着更高的后测试分数比教师和儿童在控制组的后测试分数。将进行跨组比较。在项目结束时，将采用多层次线性模型（HLM）比较教师和儿童在3年的RCT。该项目的目的是制作一套经过充分测试的双语、双文化产品，供全国传播。产品将包括一个完全可出口的、基于网络的、模块化的幼儿教育工作者STEM劳动力培训和专业发展模式，该模式侧重于通过游戏进行“初级计算机科学和预工程”。该项目由学生和教师创新技术体验（ITEST）计划资助，该计划支持建立对实践，计划元素，背景和过程的理解的项目，有助于增加学生对科学，技术，工程，信息和通信技术（ICT）该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。