Purpose: The presented study was conducted to unpack high school students' motivational influences in engineering/computer science project-based learning (PjBL), using the attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction (ARCS) model of motivation as a conceptual framework. Methods: A qualitative research approach was used with student focus…

This study explores student agency in the context of a culturally authentic computer science (CS) curriculum implemented in an introductory CS course in two high schools. Drawing on focus group and interview data, the study utilizes qualitative research methods to examine how students exercise critical agency as they engage in the course and how…

Objectives: The goal of this paper is to introduce and describe a new introductory computer science course. Research results from the implementation of this curriculum will be presented to demonstrate the nature of teachers' experiences with the curriculum. Participants: Participants are teachers implementing the new curriculum at two schools in…

Background & context: Inspired by the nature-cultures of belonging from Black hair care, we conducted a design experiment to bridge computer science (CS) education, urban gardening, and cosmetology in a culturally responsive computing (CRC) library program. Objective: The design was oriented around a small-scale aquaponics system to grow mint…

This study developed a physical computing game-design project that incorporates block-based programming, physical computing, and computer game design for Taiwan's high school technology education curriculum to strengthen students' computational thinking. The project asked students to develop a somatosensory computer game using a block-based…

Background and Context: While assessment of computational thinking concepts, practices, and perspectives is at the forefront of K-12 CS education, supporting student "communication about computation" has received relatively little attention. Objective: To examine the usability of process-based portfolios for capturing students'…

Data science surrounds us in contexts as diverse as climate change, air pollution, route-finding, genomics, market manipulation, and movie recommendations. To open the "data-science-black-box" for lower secondary school students, we developed a data science teaching unit focusing on the analysis of environmental data, which we embedded…

Background and Context: Physical computing involves complex negotiations of multiple, on and off-screen tasks, which calls for research on how to best structure collaborative work to ensure equitable learning. Objective: We focus on how pairs self-organized their multi-domain tasks in physical computing, and how their social interactions supported…

It is evident that the society in which we live will demand more and more qualified and specialized positions in the different branches of engineering. Now we are in a highly digitized world in which information is continuously transmitted through data communication networks with the expectation of security and confidentiality. Students who are in…

Recent changes have been made in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education in the United States with the goal of increasing the number of students pursuing degrees and careers in STEM. The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) integrate new science and engineering standards in an attempt to achieve this goal and are the…

Literature on global employability signifies "enabling" learning environments where students encounter ill-formed and open-ended problems and are required to adapt and be creative. Varying forms of "projects," co-located and distributed, have populated computing curricula for decades and are generally deemed an answer to this…

"Thriving in Our Digital World" is a technology-enhanced dual enrollment course introducing high school students to computer science through project- and problem-based learning. This article describes the evolution of the course and five lessons learned during the design, development, implementation, and iteration of the course from its…

Aim/Purpose: This work aims to introduce and evaluate an instructional strategy that aids end-users with developing their software products during intensive project-based events. Background: End-users produce software in the labor market, and one of the challenges for End-User Software Engineering (EUSE) is the need to create functional software…

Portfolios have recently gained traction within computer science education as a way to assess students' computational thinking and practices. Whereas traditional assessments such as exams tend to capture learning within artificial settings at a single point in time, portfolios provide more authentic opportunities to document a trajectory of…

As digital and physical fabrication kits become increasingly accessible to novice and youth design and maker activities, efforts are continuing to investigate ways that computing can be inclusive, accessible and culturally responsive. An effort that demonstrates promise for equity is combining multiple toolkits that tap into different affordances…