This qualitative case study was designed to explore pre-service teachers' computational thinking and programming skills in an educational technology course in which block-based programming was introduced in a teacher education program. 12 teacher candidates from different subject areas participated in the study. The findings show that…

In this study, the effects of Arduino IDE and C++ programming languages were investigated on the computational thinking skills of preservice teachers. The Computational Thinking Skills Scale was administered to preservice teachers. Firstly, a basic programming training was given and then it was asked to create group projects on a voluntary basis.…

Teaching programming skills has attracted a great deal of attention for more than a decade. One potential reason behind this is that the explicit teaching of computer programming can improve higher-order thinking skills, such as creativity. Moreover, whether or not creative programming learning activities, such as the use of…

Informed by the person-object theory of interest, this study deployed a mixed-method concurrent triangulation design and investigated the impact of major/specialization, gender, and module design on preservice teachers' interest in teaching computational thinking. The study was conducted in a flipped computational thinking module hosted in three…

Recent US science standards conceptualize science as a set of shared multidisciplinary ideas and practices in common with engineering and computer science (CS). At the core, this portrayal requires an understanding of CS as a viable career path and set of discrete knowledge and skills, including those related to computer programming. However,…

Computational thinking -- the ability to reformulate and solve problems in ways that can be undertaken by computers -- has been heralded as a foundational capability for the 21st Century. However, there are potentially different ways to conceptualise and measure computational thinking, for instance, as generalized problem solving capabilities or…

Creativity and problem-solving are 21st-century skills that we need to develop in our students. Research on computational thinking (CT) integration in school subjects and STEAM activities has shown a positive effect on students' problem-solving skills and creativity. Our study extends our previous work from the integration of CT in a mathematics…

The increased emergence of digital tools in educational contexts have changed the conditions for teaching and learning which, in turn, has meant a need for the development of professional digital competence (PDC) among teachers worldwide. Simultaneously, and aligned with this, programming has become an increasingly important part of schooling in…

This study investigated the effect of project-based Arduino robot application on students' computational thinking skills development in robotics programming course using the quasi-experimental research design. The participants consist of 73 students in tertiary institutions in South-East Nigeria that offer Computer and Robotics Education…

Evaluating the quality of students' programs is necessary for better teaching and learning. Although many innovative learning environments for computer science have been introduced, the scarcity of program evaluation frames and tools is a demanding issue in the teaching practice. This study examined the quality of students' Scratch programs by…

In order to reflect on the lack of developing content knowledge of technology education in Taiwan's primary teacher education, the main aim of this study was to develop a STEM-based game-design project for helping preservice primary teachers acquire computational thinking concepts in a teacher education course and to evaluate its effectiveness.…

In the last years, a growing trend in different educational contexts focused on Computational Thinking (CT) skills acquisition for both in-service teachers and students. But very low attention has been paid to pre-service teachers' education in regards to CT skills. To solve this issue, an empirical experimentation has been carried out with 141…

This study aims to evaluate the teaching of the programming process carried out through scenarios related to daily life within the framework of Reverse Engineering and the Theory of Didactical Situations. The sample of the study consists of 15 prospective computer and instructional technology education teachers. Quantitative and qualitative data…

Computational thinking (CT) is considered a group of problem-solving skills that the next generations are expected to possess. The most efficient way to make them acquire these skills is to incorporate CT into K-12 education. To this end, various education programs have been designed to improve teachers' and prospective teachers' competence in CT.…

The cultivation of computational thinking and programing education have gained prominence in K-12 education worldwide. Primary school teachers should be proficient in visual programing and using microcontrollers to teach programing courses. To cope with these trends, a learning activity was developed and implemented in Taiwan's primary teacher…