An official website of the United States government
Abstract This paper outlines the potential gains for Constructionist research and praxis in modelling that might be obtained by recognising the power of the Patch—a humble computational being in the NetLogo modelling environment that has been overshadowed by its more popular fellow agent, the Turtle. To contextualise this opportunity, I describe how Constructionist modelling has thrived by promoting forms of learning that rely on learners’ identifying with agents. I argue that patches are a neglected agent type in this multi‐agent modelling tradition, and that the possibilities for learners to adopt the patch perspective in support of exploratory forms of modelling and aesthetic expression have been under‐researched. Nevertheless, I show there are a variety of powerful ways for learners––both individually and in groups––to identify with patches. I describe ongoing research showing how taking an aesthetic approach to patches has the potential to support individuals and groups in powerful forms of learning with and about multi‐agent modelling. Practitioner notesWhat is already known about this topicTurtles (movable agents in Logo and Constructionist environments descended from Logo) can be ‘transitional objects’ that provide learners a way to make powerful ideas their own.These agents can be powerful ‘objects‐to‐think‐with’ in large part because they encourage learners to identify with them in a form of learning known as ‘syntonic learning’.Expressive activities that draw on learners’aestheticinterests can support their learning with and about computational representations.Multi‐agent modelling is a powerful extension of Logo‐based learning environments that provides access to powerful ideas about complex systems and their emergent properties.In the multi‐agent setting, individual learners and/or groups of learners can identify syntonically with agents to provide entry points for reasoning about complexity.What this paper addsPatches (non‐movable agents in the NetLogo modelling environment) are under‐represented in the research on multi‐agent modelling, and the potential for learners to adopt the patches’ perspective has been neglected.An aesthetically driven approach to patches can ground students’ understanding of their expressive value.Participatory activities in which learners play the role of patches (called ‘Stadium Card’ activities) can ground the patch perspective, so that learners can achieve a form of syntonicity and/or collectively adopt the perspective of patches in the aggregate.Participatory activities that blend intrinsic and extrinsic perspectives on the patch grid can further enhance learners’ facility with programming for patches and their understanding of patches’ collective expressive power.Implications for practice and/or policyBalancing the focus between turtles and patches can enrich the modelling toolbox of learners new to agent‐based modelling.Patchesdocapture important aspects of individual and collective experience, and so can be good objects‐to‐think‐with, especially when conceptualising phenomena at a larger scale.The expressive potential of the patch grid is an important topic for computer science as well (eg, through 2D cellular automata). This is a rich context for learning in itself, which can be made accessible to groups of learners through physical or virtual participatory role‐play.Moreover, physical or virtual grids of people‐patches may exhibit novel aggregate computational properties that could in turn become interesting areas for research in computer science.
more »
« less
Debugging by design: A constructionist approach to high school students' crafting and coding of electronic textiles as failure artefacts
Abstract Much attention in constructionism has focused on designing tools and activities that support learners in designing fully finished and functional applications and artefacts to be shared with others. But helping students learn to debug their applications often takes on a surprisingly more instructionist stance by giving them checklists, teaching them strategies or providing them with test programmes. The idea of designing bugs for learning—ordebugging by design—makes learners agents of their own learning and, more importantly, of making and solving mistakes. In this paper, we report on our implementation of ‘Debugging by Design’ activities in a high school classroom over a period of 8 hours as part of an electronic textiles unit. Students were tasked to craft the electronic textile artefacts with problems or bugs for their peers to solve. Drawing on observations and interviews, we answer the following research questions: (1) How did students participate in making bugs for others? (2) What did students gain from designing and solving bugs for others? In the discussion, we address the opportunities and challenges that designing personally and socially meaningful failure artefacts provides for becoming objects‐to‐think‐with and objects‐to‐share‐with in student learning and promoting new directions in constructionism. Practitioner notesWhat is already known about this topicThere is substantial evidence for the benefits of learning programming and debugging in the context of constructing personally relevant and complex artefacts, including electronic textiles.Related, work on productive failure has demonstrated that providing learners with strategically difficult problems (in which they ‘fail’) equips them to better handle subsequent challenges.What this paper addsIn this paper, we argue that designing bugs or ‘failure artefacts’ is as much a constructionist approach to learning as is designing fully functional artefacts.We consider how ‘failure artefacts’ can be both objects‐to‐learn‐with and objects‐to‐share‐with.We introduce the concept of ‘Debugging by Design’ (DbD) as a means to expand application of constructionism to the context of developing ‘failure artifacts’.Implications for practice and/or policyWe conceptualise a new way to enable and empower students in debugging—by designing creative, multimodal buggy projects for others to solve.The DbD approach may support students in near‐transfer of debugging and the beginning of a more systematic approach to debugging in later projects and should be explored in other domains beyond e‐textiles.New studies should explore learning, design and teaching that empower students to design bugs in projects in mischievous and creative ways.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1742140
- PAR ID:
- 10452105
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley-Blackwell
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- British Journal of Educational Technology
- Volume:
- 52
- Issue:
- 3
- ISSN:
- 0007-1013
- Format(s):
- Medium: X Size: p. 1078-1092
- Size(s):
- p. 1078-1092
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Abstract This paper provides an experience report on a co‐design approach with teachers to co‐create learning analytics‐based technology to support problem‐based learning in middle school science classrooms. We have mapped out a workflow for such applications and developed design narratives to investigate the implementation, modifications and temporal roles of the participants in the design process. Our results provide precedent knowledge on co‐designing with experienced and novice teachers and co‐constructing actionable insight that can help teachers engage more effectively with their students' learning and problem‐solving processes during classroom PBL implementations. Practitioner notesWhat is already known about this topicSuccess of educational technology depends in large part on the technology's alignment with teachers' goals for their students, teaching strategies and classroom context.Teacher and researcher co‐design of educational technology and supporting curricula has proven to be an effective way for integrating teacher insight and supporting their implementation needs.Co‐designing learning analytics and support technologies with teachers is difficult due to differences in design and development goals, workplace norms, and AI‐literacy and learning analytics background of teachers.What this paper addsWe provide a co‐design workflow for middle school teachers that centres on co‐designing and developing actionable insights to support problem‐based learning (PBL) by systematic development of responsive teaching practices using AI‐generated learning analytics.We adapt established human‐computer interaction (HCI) methods to tackle the complex task of classroom PBL implementation, working with experienced and novice teachers to create a learning analytics dashboard for a PBL curriculum.We demonstrate researcher and teacher roles and needs in ensuring co‐design collaboration and the co‐construction of actionable insight to support middle school PBL.Implications for practice and/or policyLearning analytics researchers will be able to use the workflow as a tool to support their PBL co‐design processes.Learning analytics researchers will be able to apply adapted HCI methods for effective co‐design processes.Co‐design teams will be able to pre‐emptively prepare for the difficulties and needs of teachers when integrating middle school teacher feedback during the co‐design process in support of PBL technologies.more » « less
-
de Vries, E.; Hod, Y.; Ahn, J. (Ed.)Mindsets play an important role in persevering in computer science: while some learners perceive bugs as opportunities for learning, others become frustrated with failure and see it as a challenge to their abilities. Yet few studies and interventions take into account the motivational and emotional aspects of debugging and how learning environments can actively promote growth mindsets. In this paper, we discuss growth mindset practices that students exhibited in “Debugging by Design,” an intervention created to empower students in debugging—by designing e-textiles projects with bugs for their peers to solve. Drawing on observations of four student groups in a high school classroom over a period of eight hours, we examine the practices students exhibited that demonstrate the development of growth mindset, and the contexts where these practices emerged. We discuss how our design-focused, practice-first approach may be particularly well suited for promoting growth mindset in domains such as computer science.more » « less
-
Much attention has focused on designing tools and activities that support learners in designing fully finished and functional applications such as games, robots, or e-textiles to be shared with others. But helping students learn to debug their applications often takes on a surprisingly more instructionist stance by giving them checklists, teaching them strategies or providing them with test programs. The idea of designing bugs for learning—or debugging by design—makes learners again agents of their own learning and, more importantly, of making and solving mistakes. In this paper, we report on our first implementation of “debugging by design” activities in a classroom of 25 high school students over a period of eight hours as part of a longer e-textiles unit. Here students were asked to craft buggy circuits and code for their peers to solve. In this paper we introduce the design of the debugging by design unit and, drawing on observations and interviews with students and the teacher, address the following research questions: (1) What did students gain from designing and solving bugs for others? (2) How did this experience shape students’ completion of the e-textiles unit? In the discussion, we address how debugging by design contributes to students’ learning of debugging skills.more » « less
-
B. Tangney, J. Bryne (Ed.)Much attention has focused on designing tools and activities that support learners in designing fully finished and functional applications such as games, robots, or e-textiles to be shared with others. But helping students learn to debug their applications often takes on a surprisingly more instructionist stance by giving them checklists, teaching them strategies or providing them with test programs. The idea of designing bugs for learning—or debugging by design—makes learners again agents of their own learning and, more importantly, of making and solving mistakes. In this paper, we report on our first implementation of “debugging by design” activities in a classroom of 25 high school students over a period of eight hours as part of a longer e-textiles unit. Here students were asked to craft buggy circuits and code for their peers to solve. In this paper we introduce the design of the debugging by design unit and, drawing on observations and interviews with students and the teacher, address the following research questions: (1) What did students gain from designing and solving bugs for others? (2) How did this experience shape students’ completion of the e-textiles unit? In the discussion, we address how debugging by design contributes to students’ learning of debugging skills.more » « less
