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Title: Coding and Analyzing Scientific Observations From Middle School Students in Minecraft
The importance of promoting interest in STEM is crucial to the recruitment and retainment of underrepresented populations in the STEM field. We created a one-week summer camp program centered around astronomy using Minecraft to help promote interest in science. We capitalize on data logs collected from two 1-week camps in summer 2019 and code scientific observations made by campers for the types of scientific observations and their level of quality using Cohen’s Kappa. Results showed that the majority of observations are descriptive, comparative, inferential, or analogous, as opposed to being off topic or factual. We discuss possible reasons for this distribution and design implications for future reiterations.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1713609
NSF-PAR ID:
10309164
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
14th International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS) 2020
Volume:
3
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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