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By encouraging elementary students to work collaboratively, they can gain essential skills such as perspective taking, conflict negotiation, and asking for and receiving assistance. Epistemic Network Analysis (ENA) is an analytic technique that provides an alternative to more typical approaches to analyzing and synthesizing coded dialogue. This study used an easy-to-implement prompting intervention in the context of collaborative (pair) programming with upper elementary students to demonstrate the potential of ENA to understand the impact of the intervention. We found that intervention students—those given empirically-derived prompts in support of collaborative and exploratory talk—asked questions, justified their thinking, and offered alternative ideas in ways that were both qualitatively and quantitatively different from control students.

Background and Context: Researchers and practitioners have begun to incorporate collaboration in programming because of its reported instructional and professional benefits. However, younger studen...

The language and concepts used by curriculum designers are not always interpreted by children as designers intended. This can be problematic when researchers use self-reported survey instruments in concert with curricula, which often rely on the implicit belief that students’ understanding aligns with their own. We report on our refinement of a validated survey to measure upper elementary students’ attitudes and perspectives about computer science (CS), using an iterative, design-based research approach informed by educational and psychological cognitive interview processes. We interviewed six groups of students over three iterations of the instrument on their understanding of CS concepts and attitudes toward coding. Our findings indicated that students could not explain the terms computer programs nor computer science as expected. Furthermore, they struggled to understand how coding may support their learning in other domains. These results may guide the development of appropriate CS-related survey instruments and curricular materials for K–6 students.

There is a currently a shortage of computer science professionals and this shortage is projected to continue into the foreseeable future as not enough students are selecting computer science majors. Researchers and policy-makers agree that development of this career pipeline starts in elementary school. Our study examined which collaborative programming setup, pair programming (two students collaborate on one computer) or side-by-side programming (two students collaborate on the same program from two computers), fifth-grade students preferred. We also sought to understand why students preferred one method over the other and explored ideas on how to effectively design a collaborative programming environment for this age group. Our study had participants first engage in five instructional days, alternating between pair and side-by-side programming, and then conducted focus groups. We found that students overwhelmingly preferred side-by-side programming. We explain this using self-determination theory which states that behavior is motivated by three psychological needs: autonomy, competence, and psychological relatedness which side-by-side programming was better able to meet.

Systems of power - such as structural racism, a system that upholds the ideology of white supremacy - are invisible and permeate our everyday lives and un/intentionally into our research. As these systems influence what counts as 'successful' work, CSEd researchers often have to assimilate ('whiten') themselves and their work into dominant ideals that uphold these structures. This workshop brings together aspiring and early-career CSEd researchers to critically examine and unpack the impacts of systems of power on ourselves and our research practices. Such examination is necessary to strive towards a critical consciousness in the field. We investigate critical questions like the following: What are systems of power? Who has the right to participate? Who has the right to exclude? We will use group-based activities that center historicities and 'outsider' knowledge to examine CSEd research practices and theories to answer these questions. We will draft a set of guidelines and recommendations available to the broader CSEd research community from the discussions and activities.

In successful collaborative paradigms such as pair programming, students engage in productive dialogue and work to resolve conflicts as they arise. However, little is known about how elementary students engage in collaborative dialogue for computer science learning. Early findings indicate that these younger students may struggle to manage conflicts that arise during pair programming. To investigate collaborative dialogue that elementary learners use and the conflicts that they encounter, we analyzed videos of twelve pairs of fifth grade students completing pair programming activities. We developed a novel annotation scheme with a focus on collaborative dialogue and conflicts. We found that student pairs used best-practice dialogue moves such as self-explanation, question generation, uptake, and praise in less than 23% of their dialogue. High-conflict pairs antagonized their partner, whereas this behavior was not observed with low-conflict pairs. We also observed more praise (e.g., "We did it!") and uptake (e.g., "Yeah and...") in low-conflict pairs than high-conflict pairs. All pairs exhibited some conflicts about the task, but high-conflict pairs also engaged in conflicts about control of the computer and their partner's contributions. The results presented here provide insights into the collaborative process of young learners in CS problem solving, and also hold implications for educators as we move toward building learning environments that support students in this context.

Collaborative learning has demonstrated benefits for girls in computer science [7] and this may be a way to help address the gender gap in CS. Research indicates that while collaborating, boys often express more individualistic ideas whereas girls tend to be more supportive [1]. It is important for students to regulate their learning in collaborative learning environments because they need to negotiate group goals and diverse approaches to the task [3], and the use of open-ended tasks with multiple solution paths are common [4]. There is minimal research in CS education on regulation of learning (e.g., [5,6,]). Co-regulated learning is the process in which an other helps regulate the learning of a student [2] self such as by asking questions that prompt the student to monitor and evaluate (e.g., "What do you already know about 'if' blocks that would help here?''). In this way, thinking and reasoning through the problem is shared by the group members [2] self. Our work lies in the context of upper elementary students pair programming. We investigated how four 5th grade dyads differentially regulated their learning and explored the co-occurrence of students' coded discourse by gender. Initial findings indicate that boys monitored their learning and engaged in individualistic, disagreement, and collaborative-coded statements. Girls engaged in all three components of the regulation cycle, while offering collaborative, disagreement, confusion, and tutoring-coded statements. Confusion was often expressed as not understanding the partner or the task such as "Wait! What are you talking about?'' Individualistic utterances reflect no clear attempt to involve the partner, such as "You can trust me to handle it.'' Both occur far more than desired for collaborative work. Our findings can be used to inform the personalization of human and AI support in ways that will help both groups of students co-regulate and reduce the gender gap in computer science.

As computer science education opportunities for elementary students (grades K-5) are expanding, there is growing interest in using pair programming with these students. However, previous research findings do not fully support its use with younger learners, and some researchers have begun to examine whether introducing a second computer with a shared coding workspace can provide important benefits. This experience report describes a series of classroom activities in the 4th and 5th grades (ages 9-11 years old) with two different pair programming configurations: one-computer pair programming, in which both students share a keyboard, mouse, and monitor; and two-computer pair programming, in which each student has a separate computer but coding workspaces are synchronized over the web. In both cases the students sat next to each other and engaged in face-to-face conversation. We found that students largely preferred two-computer pair programming over one-computer pair programming. We conducted focus groups and transcribed collaborative dialogues to gain more insight into this preference. We learned that students felt more independence in two-computer pair programming, although they struggled with coordinating their edits with their partner. In one-computer pair programming, students reported not wanting to wait for their turn to drive, but feeling as though they communicated more with their partner. Both configurations can be productive for students, but the tradeoffs described in this experience report are important for CS educators and researchers to consider when determining which collaborative configuration to use in each K-5 classroom context.

Collaboration is a vital part of the discipline of computer science, yet very little is known about how young children collaborate to learn programming in the classroom. Consequently, we have much to understand about how we can most effectively support this learning experience. We have conducted a study of fifth grade students (ages 9–11) in the United States. Students in this study enrolled in an elective computer science course in which they completed a pair programming project spanning one week of class time (45 min per day). This article reports on a deep qualitative analysis of six collaborative student pairs. We examine the ways in which pair programming practices emerge organically within elementary school collaborations, including the ways in which students’ roles arise, equity of contributions to the dialogue, and how students manage their responsibilities during the collaborative process. Our results show that for some student pairs, making suggestions in the dialogue is a natural mechanism for swapping control, whereas for other students, the transition from “driver” to “navigator” requires substantial scaffolding. The findings provide insights into the ways in which we can scaffold the collaborative process to support young students’ computer science learning.

Demand for K-6 computer science (CS) curricula is growing considerably. Many of the existing curricula have been developed by domain experts who are comfortable with specific and technical terminology, which they expect students to master. However, children are not always comfortable with these terms nor do they understand general concepts like 'coding' in the way that the curriculum designers intend. This is a problem because many researchers use self-report and attitudinal survey instruments with the implicit belief that the students' understanding of the terms and concepts resemble their own. This mismatch may invalidate results. For this project, we report on our modification of a validated survey to measure upper elementary students' attitudes about and perspectives on CS by attempting to understand the appropriate language to use when querying children about these topics. We use an iterative, design-based research approach that is informed by educational and psychological cognitive interview processes. We interviewed two groups (N=64) of upper elementary students on their understanding of computer science concepts and attitudes toward coding. Our findings indicate that 4th and 5th grade students could not explain the terms computer programs nor computer science as we had expected and that they struggled to understand how coding may connect with or support their learning in other domains. These results will help to guide the development of appropriate survey instruments and course materials for K-6 students, which both match their use of broad domain concepts and therefore inform their understanding and improve their outcomes.

Extensive prior research suggests that pair programming holds many benefits for novices. Pair programming has been well studied at the undergraduate level, and recently, the CS education research community has started to realize that younger learners may also benefit from pair programming. However, an important factor in pair programming success for young learners is the ability to resolve conflicts during the process. Little is known about what types of conflicts occur while elementary students pair program or how those conflicts are, or are not, resolved. To investigate this phenomenon, we analyzed the videos of six pairs of students completing a programming activity. We found that conflicts evolve in four general stages, which may not all be present in each conflict: initiation, escalation, de-escalation, and conclusion. Some conflicts are resolved when the students come to an agreement, others end passively. The analysis revealed that the pairs' conflicts began around disagreements about code, who should have control of the keyboard and mouse, and other interpersonal events. This research indicates that conflicts are a significant concern for young students, and supporting young learners in developing improved collaboration skills is a key direction for CS education research.

Collaboration plays an essential role in computer science. While there is growing recognition that learners of all ages can benefit from collaborative learning, little is known about how elementary-age children engage in collaborative problem solving in computer science. This paper reports on the analysis of a dataset of elementary students collaborating on a programming project. We found that children tend to make several different types of suggestions. In turn, their partners address those suggestions in different ways such as by implementing them directly in code or by replying through dialogue. We observe that students regularly accept or reject suggestions without explanation or explicit acknowledgement and that it is often unclear whether they understand the substance of the suggestion. These behaviors may inhibit the development of a shared understanding between the partners and limit the value of the collaborative process. These results can inform instructional practice and the development of new adaptive tools that facilitate productive collaborative problem solving in computer science.

Block-based programming environments are a good way to teach beginners how to code, in part because they eliminate syntax errors and provide visual feedback. However, many of the existing environments do not explicitly support synchronous collaboration. Collaboration is a critical component of computer science practice and CS education. We therefore argue that features to support collaboration could significantly enhance existing and new block-based programming environments. We review existing block-based programming environments, suggest design ideas for supporting synchronous collaboration, and evaluate environments that currently support some of these features.

Elementary computer science has gained increasing attention within the computer science education research community. We have only recently begun to explore the many unanswered questions about how young students learn computer science, how they interact with each other, and how their skill levels and backgrounds vary. One set of unanswered questions focuses on gender equality for young computer science learners. This paper examines how the gender composition of collaborative groups in elementary computer science relates to student achievement. We report on data collected from an in-school 5th grade computer science elective offered over four quarters in 2014-2015. We found a significant difference in the quality of artifacts produced by learner groups depending upon their gender composition, with groups of all female students performing significantly lower than other groups. Our analyses suggest important factors that are influential as these learners begin to solve computer science problems. This new evidence of gender disparities in computer science achievement as young as ten years of age highlights the importance of future study of these factors in order to provide effective, equitable computer science education to learners of all ages.

This paper presents a solution to count all moving vehicles in a target region. This is a large-scale counting that cannot be easily solved without a global view. However, there is no single force that can provide such a global view. To achieve an accurate result without either double- or miscounting, the local counting at each checkpoint is synchronized in our wireless communication by using the information carried by vehicles along the traffic flow. Our analytical and experimental results illustrate the correctness of the proposed scheme in both closed and open road systems - even when the wireless signal is affected by many factors. In this way, we provide an essential support for the resource management in VANETs.