Initial experience with a computational thinking course for computer science students

Authors:
Dennis Kafura;Deborah Tatar
Affiliations:
Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA;Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Venue:
Proceedings of the 42nd ACM technical symposium on Computer science education
Year:
2011

Citing 8
Cited 4

Great principles of computing

Communications of the ACM - Blueprint for the future of high-performance networking
Computational thinking

Communications of the ACM - Self managed systems
Computational thinking

Proceedings of the 38th SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education
Education: Paving the way for computational thinking

Communications of the ACM - Designing games with a purpose
A multidisciplinary approach towards computational thinking for science majors

Proceedings of the 40th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education
MPCT: media propelled computational thinking

Proceedings of the 41st ACM technical symposium on Computer science education
Teaching computational thinking through musical live coding in scratch

Proceedings of the 41st ACM technical symposium on Computer science education
Snoopy - a unifying Petri net framework to investigate biomolecular networks

Bioinformatics

Interdisciplinary teaching and learning in computing science: three years of experience in the MoCSSy program

Proceedings of the Seventeenth Western Canadian Conference on Computing Education
Statistical evidence of the correlation between mental ability to compute and student performance in undergraduate courses

Proceedings of the 17th ACM annual conference on Innovation and technology in computer science education
Snoopy --- a unifying petri net tool

PETRI NETS'12 Proceedings of the 33rd international conference on Application and Theory of Petri Nets
Can the teaching of HCI contribute for the learning of computer science the case of semiotic engineering methods

Proceedings of the 11th Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems

Quantified Score

Hi-index	0.00

Visualization

Abstract

Experience with the first offering of a computational thinking course for computer science (CT4CS) students is reported. The course is grounded in student interaction with fundamental, recurring concepts suggested by comparison with two sets of computer science principles. By using specialized, freely available tools and physical simulations it is possible to provide concrete, tangible learning experiences that neither require knowledge of nor the overhead of programming. Student end-of-term reflections indicate that the course deepened and broadened their understanding of computer science even when they had previously encountered a topic, and improved their computer science vocabulary.