Project Profile

Research has demonstrated the value of introducing computing education in early childhood for its cost-effectiveness and longer-lasting impacts compared to later interventions. This Designing and Testing Innovations project addresses the need for diverse approaches to render computing accessible and developmentally appropriate for young children, while actively integrating their linguistic, cultural, and communal identities. Targeting young, rural, and indigenous students, this initiative aims to develop and research the effectiveness of portable maker carts equipped with developmentally appropriate computational activities. These carts are designed to foster computational thinking skills and cultivate interest in STEM among participants. The design of the carts combines hands-on making activities commonly found in early childhood classrooms with tangible computing tasks, ensuring cultural relevance and developmental appropriateness (for instance, incorporating e-textiles and squishy circuits for weaving patterns, interactive play, and storytelling). Students will engage in projects to create their own interactive, culturally linked weaving patterns using conductive playdough, electronic textiles materials, LED lights, and micro-controllers. Simultaneously, they will be introduced to the types of jobs that require computing knowledge. Through this approach, young children will learn about cause and effect, patterns, and sequencing in a manner that is connected to culturally significant practices, such as Navajo rug weaving, while also being exposed to computing and engineering professions. The project will be collaboratively undertaken by the Red Mesa Unified School District on the Navajo Nation in Arizona's Four Corners area, along with learning scientists from Utah State University and Boston College.

The proposed maker carts, coupled with associated computing curriculum and teacher professional development, will serve as a model for designing tangible, developmentally and culturally appropriate computing experiences for young children. Project research will use quantitative and qualitative approaches rooted in community-based and design-based research paradigms. The research will investigate: (1) how to foster school and community partnerships with university researchers, early childhood educators, children, and parents that support co-design of education programs and (2) how culturally responsive making practices using innovative technologies can foster computational thinking and career concepts among young Navajo and rural participants using Maker carts with computer science activities. In its research phase, the project will reach 9 early childhood educators and 100 Navajo children in the rural Red Mesa Unified School District. In its final year, the project will reach an additional 20 early childhood educators and 20 preservice educators through professional development, extending the impact to several hundred additional Indigenous and non-Indigenous students in rural areas. The project will disseminate project research and educational resources via teacher professional development workshops, conferences, and publications reaching researchers and educators.

The 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.