RAPID: Developing Computational Thinking through Digital Storytelling: Coping with the Effects of the Oil Spill

G84 Consulting, Birmingham AL

Investigators

Abstract

The dual motivations for this proposal are to address a nationally recognized need to prepare a computationally savvy 21st Century workforce, and the immediate need to respond to the emotional impact of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. There is a growing recognition of the importance of computational thinking, a set of strategies, skills, and capacities that draw on ideas from the computing disciplines. These skills are valuable for understanding and solving problems in a wide range of contexts beyond the field of computer science, and can help students to be competitive in the global innovation economy. Since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded in April 2010 and oil began gushing into the Gulf of Mexico, individuals, families, and communities along the coast of the Gulf have been stressed by threats to their livelihoods, their health, and their immediate environment. Confronted with 206 million gallons of oil, the water, fishing and tourism industries took a downturn. Impacted students in the region were not in school during much of the time of the disaster, and when they returned, many may not have had the opportunity to share their personal experiences with their peer groups. Although the spill was stopped, the aftereffects still loom. The time is ripe, then, to aid students in documenting, reflecting, and grappling with the specifics of the disaster, their emotional responses to it, and productive ways to cope, as well as study the spill in the immediate environment in which it is taking place. In this project, the PI partners with an urban elementary school site (> 98% minority population) in New Orleans, Louisiana, to develop, implement, and study new instructional materials that place the cultivation of computational thinking into the context of social and emotional learning. More specifically, the strategic aims are the following: -SA1. Develop new instructional materials geared toward the cultivation of computational thinking in the context of social and emotional learning. -SA2. Study the potential of these materials to develop computational competencies and support emotional reflection when utilized with students in an informal setting. These strategic aims will be assessed utilizing nominal group techniques, semi-structured interviews, and artifact analysis. Most social-emotional learning or coping programs are separated from the academic context, while many computational thinking programs are devoid of meaningful context. The intellectual merit of this research is a new program that fuses twenty first century learning skills with social and emotional learning which can transform the way students engage with each of these areas. The broader impact, in part, is a curricular framework for blending these areas that will be disseminated through an online website for teachers interested in supporting students in building computational thinking skills. Further, as Scratch becomes available online, students will be programming in the cloud, and begin to participate in our nation's cyberinfrastructure.