This study examined the effects of embodied learning experiences on students' understanding of computational thinking (CT) concepts and their ability to solve CT problems. In a mixed-reality learning environment, students mapped CT concepts, such as sequencing and loops, onto their bodily movements. These movements were later applied to robot…

Using robotics and programming, this study investigated the effects of different levels of embodied instruction on the problem-solving, debugging, programming proficiency, self-determination, and self-efficacy of students in ethnically diverse elementary classrooms. The first small-scale, quasi-experimental study involved 37 second-graders, who…

This study explored whether the computational thinking skills of early elementary-aged students be positively impacted by participation in a robotics-based, classroom intervention. Action research was used to examine the impact of a multifaceted, constructionist, robotics-based intervention on 37 second and third grade students at an elementary…

The present study investigated the usefulness of a pre-programmed, teleoperated, socially assistive peer robot in dynamic testing of complex problem solving utilising the Tower of Hanoi. The robot, in a 'Wizard of Oz' setting, provided instructions and prompts during dynamic testing to children when they had to solve 3 D Tower of Hanoi puzzles.…

This study, a sub-study of a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded research project, applies a modified strategy of the U[superscript 2]MC for an eight-week afterschool robotics curriculum to promote upper elementary students' computational thinking in the second grade. Twenty-one students in second grade participated in a Life on Mars project…

Prior work demonstrates the importance of introducing young children to programming and engineering content before gender stereotypes are fully developed and ingrained in later years. However, very little research on gender and early childhood technology interventions exist. This pilot study looks at N = 45 children in kindergarten through second…