A comprehensive assessment of secondary school students' computational thinking skills

Polat E., Hopcan S., KÜÇÜK S., Sisman B.

BRITISH JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY, cilt.52, sa.5, ss.1965-1980, 2021 (SSCI) identifier identifier

  • Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
  • Cilt numarası: 52 Sayı: 5
  • Basım Tarihi: 2021
  • Doi Numarası: 10.1111/bjet.13092
  • Dergi Adı: BRITISH JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY
  • Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Scopus, Academic Search Premier, Periodicals Index Online, Compendex, EBSCO Education Source, Education Abstracts, Educational research abstracts (ERA), ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), INSPEC, MLA - Modern Language Association Database, Psycinfo, DIALNET
  • Sayfa Sayıları: ss.1965-1980
  • Anahtar Kelimeler: assessment, coding, computational thinking perception, computational thinking skills, secondary education, SCIENCE, IMPLEMENTATION, DESIGN, K-12
  • Atatürk Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet

Özet

Performance in and perceptions of computational thinking (CT) are considered vital dimensions for comprehensively assessing CT skills of students. In this study, secondary school students' CT performance and their perceptions were examined in terms of certain variables including gender, grade level, achievement and self-efficacy. Casual-comparative and correlational methods were used. The sample of the study consisted of a total of 328 fifth- and sixth-grade (10-12 years old) secondary school students taking visual programming lessons. CT performance and perception tests were employed as data collection tools. The results show that CT performance of boys was higher than that of girls. A significant difference was found in both CT performance and perception depending on grades. The results show that achievement in math positively affected CT performance and perception. However, achievement in IT affected CT performance less than achievement in math. Implications are discussed in terms of theoretical insights, practices for improving CT skills in secondary schools and directions for further research.