Cultivating Interest and Competencies in Computing Authentic Experiences and Design Factors (2021) / Chapter Skim
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7 Designing Authentic Experiences for Computing
7 Designing Authentic Experiences for Computing
Pages 121-148
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Based on the evidence to date, the committee offers broad guidance to program designers. This chapter is written to serve as a guide to readers who wish to d esign authentic experiences for computing that attract and support diverse learners.
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. That said, providing experiences that are both professionally and personally authentic is difficult, as there is often a tension between professional and personal authenticity that the design of learning experiences must address.
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The committee offers a set of seven design considerations, which include (1) Learners; (2)
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Duration • How are the total time and frequency of the learning experiences related to desired learning outcomes? • What duration-related constraints are presented by the learning setting for personal and/or professional authenticity in computing?
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Researchers have been examining how having a deeper understanding of the learners involved, beyond simple numbers or basic demographics, can enable the development of a more robust, personally meaningful authentic experience (Calabrese Barton and Tan, 2019; Cornelius-White, 2007; Eccles and Wigfield, 2002; Farrington et al., 2012; Guzdial, 2015; ImmordinoYang and Damasio, 2007; Pintrich, 2003; Roorda et al., 2011; Weinberg, Basile, and Albright, 2011)
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. The strict syntactic demands of programming languages may be an obstacle to English Learners (ELs)
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. This was accom plished through the creation of learning experiences that "were flexible, included modeling, and scaffolded computing instruction and independent work through both guided practice and collaborative problem solving" (p.
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For some learners, their perceptions of computing may call into question the authenticity of the tool -- if they perceive themselves as "good at programming" but do not perceive the tool as professionally authentic, then they might perceive the tool as being less personally authentic. However, for others, a more personally authentic tool may serve as an entry point into developing interest and competency.
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Box 7-2 provides a discussion of how CompuGirls navigates the intertwined social processes. Acknowledging the cultural backgrounds and experiences of learners by taking the time to ask about and understand their conceptualizations of STEM and computing is essential, as this can allow for diversity in perspectives and broaden the range of personally meaningful experiences for design (Calabrese Barton et al., 2013; Krivet and Krajcik, 2008)
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Community Learning is a social process, supported in formal and informal ways by the people that a learner encounters over the course of various learning experiences. As introduced in Chapter 3, a growing body of literature suggests that learning is a matter of participation, engagement, and membership in a community of practice (Nasir and Cook, 2009; Wenger, 1998)
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. Generally, facilitators and educators help orient learners to new learning experiences and prompt them to ask new questions and pursue new types of learning (Clegg and Kolodner, 2014; NRC, 2009, 2011b, 2012)
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and families, can play active roles in helping to facilitate the learning experience. A number of different programs have been developed to explicitly consider families and family learning as a central thread in their design.
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is a teacher-led orga nization intended to support computer science teachers' professional learning and teaching. CSTA provides support to teachers to establish local chapters, which are geographically-organized gatherings for discussing challenges and opportunities teachers are experiencing, and disseminates a monthly newsletter.
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. It centers learner agency and "powerful ideas" -- an early commitment to advancing both personally authentic and professionally authentic (in terms of disciplinary authenticity)
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, Digital Youth Divas (Box 7-5) , the Clubhouse Network (Box 7-6)
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Inextricably linked to activity design are the considerations of the learners and their identities, the environments and communities that they are a part of, and the tools and resources used. Research studies on Digital Youth Divas have also highlighted the importance of narratives and stories (Erete et al., 2016; Pinkard et al., 2017)
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Resnick describes the engagement as grounded in a variety of interests -- personal hobbies, important events, meaningful relationships -- and providing fuel for sustained work over time. He writes, "Clubhouse members often worked long hours on these projects, coming back to the Clubhouse day after day." For some Clubhouse members, that time at the Clubhouse develop ing projects that were personally authentic led to opportunities for professionally authentic learning experiences, as well as returning to the Clubhouse to support the personally authentic learning of others through intergenerational learning.
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. When evaluating activities and learning environments that are collaborative, open-ended, occurring across different physical spaces and online platforms, and long in duration, which describe many of the pedagogies and examples used in authentic learning for computing, conventional assessment techniques can be harder to apply (Murai et al., 2019)
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t is extremely difficult to come to firm conclusions about the impact of learning environments because of the multi-faceted nature of environments and the subsequent 4 These disciplines include architecture, engineering, design, ergonomics, psychology, eth nography, and learning sciences.
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. Schools or Campus-Style Learning Environments Inspired by heightened interest in STEM and computer science, and deliberately designing for equity, some schools and youth development programs have created holistic, large-scale, sometimes campus-style learning environments.
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. Design considerations may differ for the two scenarios, and research on how best to design online environments for involuntary participants is not yet available -- though a surge in such research is expected on remote learning triggered by the COVID-19 crisis.
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And central to the continuation of such communities is knowing who the intended audience is. Duration How long a young person is engaged within an individual learning experience -- and across an ecosystem of learning experiences -- is another consideration of design.
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But the lack of expectation of commitment can result in attrition, either completely or partially, leading to discontinuity in the learning experience and undermining the time required to foster learning in authentic experiences. As discussed in Chapter 5, it is important to note, also, that there are inherent inequities in access to out-of-school learning opportunities, due to cost, accessibility of locations, or varying personal or family responsibilities.
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As an example of constraining genres of projects, the Scratch programming environment opted to support programming 2D worlds, while the Alice programming environment opted to support programming 3D worlds. Both Scratch and Alice have been designed to make programming accessible to learners and teachers with little to no programming experience (i.e., the "low floor")
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For example, instead of snapping virtual programming blocks together, young children snap together physical programming blocks with the KIBO programming environment, a developmentally easier entry point for small children. E-textiles expand the range of creative production, widening (or maybe moving)
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Ultimately, the design of authentic experiences for computing yields the strongest results when it is conducted as an iterative, rather than linear, process. The design of a learning experience is not about the application of relevant principles and hoping they lead to the desired outcomes.
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. Design for Authenticity Professional Authenticity • Ensure practices modeled align with professional practices and communicate alignment • Examine activities and resources • Determine whether the duration is sufficient to develop skills associated with profession Personal Authenticity • Consult with audience to understand whether personal authenticity is being achieved • Determine what adjustments are needed to activities Attract Learners • Consider original objectives of design in relation to intended audience • Examine marketing strategies and messaging • Use data to inform initial iterations Measure Learning Objectives • Work backwards from learning objectives to activities to ensure alignment • Ensure learning objectives are clearly defined • Assess what matters • Ensure relevant data are produced Measure Interest • Document whether interest is changing • Collect and include feedback on interest impact from learners • Identify and modify breaking points that may lead learners to disengage Evaluate Program Drift • Determine whether program still has intended focus • Restructure, reframe, or change activities to align with goals • Bring in additional expertise as needed Take Programs to Scale • Ensure program grounded in clearly articulated and specific principles • Connect outcomes to a logic model • Build capacity to support the program or partner with organizations that have capacity • Begin testing hypotheses at small scales and supplement program with materials as needed • Generate evidence to determine program effectiveness • Continuously test and refine program, as needed
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From page 148... ...
Important considerations for design include attending to the social elements of the experience, such as who the intended learners are and the prior experiences they bring as well as who supports the learners and what experiences educators and facilitators need. Central to any authentic experience for computing is the activity -- or what the learner is doing -- as well as the ways in which the environment and duration of the activity can sufficiently engage learners.
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