Until recently, computing was not considered a subject within the National Curriculum (Berry, 2014). Since recent changes in 2014, computing has since replaced ICT, after the subject being portrayed as unchallenging and outdated (Burns, 2012). Department for Education (2014) introduced computing, in the aim to allow children access to opportunities that build and develop computational logic. With further expectations for children to progress their knowledge of computing systems and programming. Berry (2014), supported the importance of computational thinking for opportunities in later life, arguing it allows them to adapt with adequate knowledge to the ever-evolving digital world.
Within the current National Curriculum, the term “computational thinking”, has been addressed over a wider range of curriculum subjects, such as the computational aspects used for science experiments (Rubinstein and Chor, 2014). The introduction of computing as a practical subject, has provided teachers further opportunity to advance aspects of learning, such as problem solving (Turvey et al, 2016).
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Drawing on my own experiences, it was evident there was a lack of emphasis towards computing, due to the demands of the teachers timetable. When providing a small group of children the opportunity to participate with a computing activity, the children responded positively, demonstrating empowerment and confidence. Berry (2014), can support this display of empowerment, through discussing the use of computing in schools, allowing children to gain a sense of empowerment, to become active and creative in their own work.
However, when providing further details for creating a PowerPoint quiz, children surprisingly displayed confusion when understanding the basic requirements of this programme. Consequently, this caused a high demand for support when enabling children to gain a real sense of confidence in understanding the functions of PowerPoint.
During the activity, children were supported through a variety of strategies for their learning. Within the first stage of the activity, the task was broken down into small steps. In doing this, children were able to grasp confidence in understanding different aspects of using PowerPoint. Once children demonstrated sufficient understanding and knowledge of each stage, they would refer to me showing their work before progressing to the next stage. Once children successfully worked through all the phases of creating a PowerPoint quiz, they were offered extra time to independently complete the quiz themselves, allowing myself time, to assess the children’s progress in computational thinking. In addition to these strategies, each stage of the activity was modelled by myself, thus ensuring children could visualise and understand each stage for themselves, before applying this to their own work.
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As indicated previously, children demonstrated a lack of experience when using PowerPoint, which may have stemmed from the development of computing within the National Curriculum and in schools. With learning the uses of programming becoming overshadowed by more prioritised concepts, such as debugging and algorithms (DfE, 2013). When drawing upon my own experiences, the use of application, like Microsoft Office, were less familiar to children.
When reflecting upon this for my own future practice, I need to ensure progression of children’s computational thinking by taking a more directed focus, specifically with the systems and key concepts of programmes. Rather than merely addressing aspects of digital literacy, such as confidence in using programmes. Therefore, for future planning and strategies, it would be necessary for myself to become more familiar and confident with the aims of the updated concepts and terminology in computing. Brown et al (2014), would argue the lack of confidence to delivering computing lessons is a common issue among many teachers. Furthermore, he discussed that because teachers themselves are unfamiliar with computing and the key concepts, they tend to avoid teaching it to children (ibid). Therefore, for my own future practice, I need to be able to become familiar with the statutory terms of computing, ensuring children with endless possibilities to progress their computational thinking in our so called ‘digital world’ (Berry, 2014).
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References:
Berry, M. (2014) Computing in the national curriculum; a guide for primary teachers. [online]. Available:< http://www.computingatschool.org.uk/data/uploads/CASPrimaryComputing.pdf> [Accessed 1st December 2016].
Brown, N. C., Sentance, S., Crick, T., Humphreys, S. (2014). “Restart: The resurgence of computer science in UK schools”. ACM Transactions on Computing Education (TOCE), 14(2), p.9.
Burns, J. (2012) “ School ICT to be replaced by computer science programme” BBC News, [online]. Available:< http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-16493929> [Accessed 14th December 2016].
Department of Education (2013) National curriculum in England: computing programmes of study, [online]. Available:< https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-computing-programmes-of-study/national-curriculum-in-england-computing-programmes-of-study> [Accessed 1st December 2016].
Department of Education (2014) National curriculum and assessment from September 2014: information for schools, [online]. Available:< https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/358070/NC_assessment_quals_factsheet_Sept_update.pdf> [Accessed 1st December 2016].
Rubinstein, A. and Chor, B. (2014). “Computational thinking in life science education”. PLoS Comput Biol, 10 (11).
Turvey, K., Potter, J., Burton, J. (2016) Primary Computing and Digital Technologies: Knowledge Understanding and Practice (7th Ed.), London: Sage.
Danielle thanks for your blog post. It is good that you have identified how the activity you have carried out does not address the aspects of the computing national curriculum identified in the brief. You have provided some reflection on how you could address this in the future. I offer the following points:
1. While creating a PowerPoint quiz with links to various slides can be seen as a programming activity at a basic level, you are correct that this does not really enable children to engage with programming and the key computing concepts identified in the the programme of study for computing.
2. You correctly identify the need to focus on the programming of systems, simulations, games etc. ie how these things work through the creation of algorithms etc. The digital literacy aspect of the computing curriculum does address more the effective use of technologies which would include Office applications.
Please could you proof read all of your blog posts carefully before submission? There are quite a few typos and some grammatical errors in this post. For example ‘which’ at the start of sentences. I do hope you get the opportunity to engage more with some of the various resources for teaching programming in your coming placements and happy to discuss this further with you.