Resources

Computational thinking (CT) is broadly defined as the mental activity for abstracting problems and formulating solutions that can be automated. In an increasingly information-based society, CT is becoming an essential skill for everyone. To ensure that students develop this ability at the K-12 level, it is important to provide teachers with an adequate knowledge about CT and how to incorporate it into their teaching. This article describes a study on designing and introducing computational thinking modules and assessing their impact on preservice teachers’ understanding of CT concepts, as well

Careers in the U.S. that require STEM knowledge have grown rapidly, reinforcing the need to develop a future workforce that is prepared to meet growing business needs and solve global challenges. Considering that there is a low number of students pursuing STEM degrees and the low percentages of minority students in the STEM pipeline, STEM education has been a focus of local and national education curriculum reform efforts. Extending beyond the classroom, university, industry, and other stakeholders have partnered to develop the future workforce by focusing on STEM K-12 outreach programming. We

The purpose of this article is to provide awareness of the danger of design fixation and promote the uses of brainstorming early in the design process--before fixation limits creative ideas. The authors challenged technology teachers to carefully limit the use of design examples too early in the process and provided suggestions for facilitating brainstorming sessions to help generate innovative ideas. The authors are not suggesting that teachers never provide design examples; in fact, this article highlights techniques for providing students with authentic examples and the benefits of this

This case study described teachers with varying technology skills who were implementing the use of geospatial technology (GST) within project-based instruction (PBI) at varying grade levels and contexts 1 to 2 years following professional development. The sample consisted of 10 fifth- to ninth-grade teachers. Data sources included artifacts, observations, interviews, and a GST performance assessment and were analyzed using a constant comparative approach. Teachers’ teaching actions, beliefs, context, and technology skills were categorized. Results indicated that all of the teachers had high

Driven by scholarly work that promotes incorporating the study of social justice issues in the engineering curriculum, this work-in-progress paper focuses on teaching social and critical consciousness in engineering. The purpose of this study is to discuss and compare the implementation of social and critical consciousness in a first-year general education engineering course and a senior design engineering course.

This paper addresses the need for enhancing our awareness of user‐centered design in educational technology through a more explicit and systematic alignment between the needs of educational technology users (learners and educators) and the affordances provided by the technology. First, we define the term “affordance” and discuss it from the perspectives of cognitive psychology and user interaction design. Next, we propose a taxonomy of functional affordances that builds on prior research and reflects the current trends in the design of educational technologies. The paper is concluded with an