Computing education is important for K-12 learners, but not all learners resonate with common educational practices. Culturally responsive computing initiatives center and empower learners from diverse and historically excluded backgrounds. Recently, a number of educational programs have been developed and curated for an online experience. In this paper, we describe an online synchronous culturally responsive computing (CRC) camp for middle school girls (ages 11-14 years old) and report on challenges and successes from running the camp curriculum four times over the course of a year. We also describe core iterative changes we made between our runs. We then discuss lessons learned related to building rapport and connection among learners, centering learners of different backgrounds in an online synchronous environment, and facilitating reflection on power and identity aimed at positioning learners as techno-social change agents. Lastly, we offer recommendations for running online CRC experiences.
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“I Want to Be Unique From Other Robots”: Positioning Girls as Co-creators of Social Robots in Culturally-Responsive Computing Education
Robot technologies have been introduced to computing education to engage learners. This study introduces the concept of co-creation with a robot agent into culturally-responsive computing (CRC). Co- creation with computer agents has previously focused on creating external artifacts. Our work differs by making the robot agent itself the co-created product. Through participatory design activities, we positioned adolescent girls and an agentic social robot as co- creators of the robot’s identity. Taking a thematic analysis approach, we examined how girls embody the role of creator and co-creator in this space. We identified themes surrounding who has the power to make decisions, what decisions are made, and how to maintain social relationship. Our findings suggest that co-creation with robot technology is a promising implementation vehicle for realizing CRC.
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- PAR ID:
- 10463394
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI ’23)
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 1 to 14
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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