This experience report describes an approach for helping elementary schools integrate computational thinking and coding by leveraging existing resources and infrastructure that do not rely on 1-1 computing. A particular focus is using the school library and media center as a site to complement and enhance classroom instruction on coding. Further, our approach builds upon "unplugged" knowledge and practices that are already familiar to and motivating for students, in this case tabletop board games. Through these games, students can use their prior knowledge and ease with tabletop gaming mechanics to cue relevant ideas for core computational concepts. We describe a model and an instructional unit spanning across classroom and school library settings that builds upon board game play as a source domain for computing knowledge. Building on expansive framing, the model emphasizes instructional linkages being made between one domain (the tabletop board game) and another (specially designed Scratch project shells with partially complete code blocks) such that the reasoning activities and different contexts are seen as instantiations of the same encompassing context. We present the experiences of three elementary school teachers as they implemented the unit in their classrooms and with their school librarian. We also show initial findings on the impact of the unit on student interest (N=87), as measured by pre- and post- surveys. We conclude with lessons learned about ways to improve the unit and future classroom implementations.
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Tabletop Games in the Age of Remote Collaboration: Design Opportunities for a Socially Connected Game Experience
Prior research has highlighted opportunities for technology to better support the tabletop game experience in offline and online settings, but little work has focused on the social aspect of tabletop gaming. We investigated the social and collaborative aspects of tabletop gaming in the unique context of “social distancing” during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic to shed light on the experience of remote tabletop gaming. With a multi-method qualitative approach (including digital ethnography and in-depth interviews), we empirically studied how people appropriate existing technologies and adapt their offline practices to play tabletop games remotely. We identify three themes that describe people’s game and social experience during remote play: creating a shared tabletop environment (shared space), enabling a collective understanding (shared information and awareness), and facilitating a communal temporal experience (shared time). We reflect on challenges and design opportunities for a better experience in the age of remote collaboration.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1651575
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10237337
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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Abstract Computational thinking is acknowledged as an essential competency for everyone to learn. However, teachers find it challenging to implement the existing learning approaches in K-12 settings because the existing approaches often focus on teaching computing concepts and skills (i.e., programming skills) rather than on helping students develop their computational thinking competency—a competency that can be used across disciplinary boundaries in accordance with curriculum requirements. To address this need, the current study investigated how game-based learning influenced middle school students’ learning processes, particularly on the development of computational thinking competency, self-efficacy toward computational thinking, and engagement during gameplay. Additionally, the study examined how these outcomes were moderated by individual differences. We observed evidence that the gaming experience influenced students’ computational thinking self-efficacy, but not computational thinking competency or game-based engagement. Compared to age (grade) and prior gaming experience, gender tended to play a more important role in moderating students’ computational thinking competency, self-efficacy toward computational thinking competency, and game-based engagement. Implications and possible directions for future research regarding using game-based learning to enhance computational thinking competency are discussed.
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Prior studies have explored the potential of erroneous examples in helping students learn more effectively by correcting errors in solutions to decimal problems. One recent study found that while students experience more confusion and frustration (confrustion) when working with erroneous examples, they demonstrate better retention of decimal concepts. In this study, we investigated whether this finding could be replicated in a digital learning game. In the erroneous examples (ErrEx) version of the game, students saw a character play the games and make mistakes, and then they corrected the characters’ errors. In the problem solving (PS) version, students played the games by themselves. We found that confrustion was significantly, negatively correlated with performance in both pretest (r = -.62, p < .001) and posttest (r = -.68, p < .001) and so was gaming the system (pretest r = -.58, p < .001, posttest r = -.66, p < .001). Posthoc (Tukey) tests indicated that students who did not see any erroneous examples (PS-only) experienced significantly lower levels of confrustion (p < .001) and gaming (p < .001). While we did not find significant differences in post-test performance across conditions, our findings show that students working with erroneous examples experience consistently higher levels of confrustion in both game and non-game contexts.more » « less
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Online harassment against women - particularly in gaming and virtual worlds contexts - remains a salient and pervasive issue, and arguably reflects the systems of offline structural oppression to control women's bodies and rights in today's world. Harassment in social Virtual Reality (VR) is also a growing new frontier of research in HCI and CSCW, particularly focusing on marginalized users such as women. Based on interviews with 31 women users of social VR, our findings present women's experiences of harassment risks in social VR as compared to harassment targeting women in pre-existing, on-screen online gaming and virtual worlds, along with strategies women employ to manage harassment in social VR with varying degrees of success. This study contributes to the growing body of literature on harassment in social VR by highlighting how women's marginalization online and offline impact their perceptions of and strategies to mitigate harassment in this unique space. It also provides a critical reflection on women's mitigation strategies and proposes important implications to rethink social VR design to better prevent harassment against women and other marginalized communities in the future metaverse.more » « less
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Non-profit driven indie game development represents a growing open and participatory game production model as an alternative to the traditional mainstream gaming industry. However, this community is also facing and coping with tensions and dilemmas brought by its focus on artistic and cultural values over economic benefits. Using 28 interviews with indie game developers with a non-profit agenda across various cultures, we investigate the challenges non-profit driven indie game developers face, which mainly emerge in their personal or collaborative labor and their endeavors to secure sustainable resources and produce quality products. Our investigation extends the current HCI knowledge of the democratization of technology and its impact on the trajectory of innovating, designing, and producing future (gaming) technologies. These insights may help increase the opportunities for and retention of previously underrepresented groups in technology production and inform effective decision/policy making to better support the creativity industry in the future.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Conference Paper:
- https://doi.org/10.1145/3411764.3445512
