Although Computational Thinking has been around for a long time, our new Alberta Science Curriculum is the first to pull it out and articulate it within an Organizing Idea across the Science curriculum from Grade 3 Science onwards: “Computer Science: Problem solving and scientific inquiry are developed through the knowledgeable application of creativity, design, and computational thinking”.
What exactly IS Computational Thinking? How can I teach this to students of all ages? And how can we support our colleagues (at various levels of comfort with technology and computer science) and ourselves in integrating computational thinking into instructional practices effectively? What does successful integration of Computational Thinking across the curriculum look like?
This session addresses the questions above, likely by revealing how you may already be teaching computational thinking--but perhaps without the defining vocabulary to name its components, to then draw these concepts out in your students’ minds as they engage in it. With this small tweak, you can leave this session with the conceptual understanding and assurance that you’re on the right track, that if problem-solving is a big part of what you work on with your students (no matter their age or the subject area), then identifying components of computational thinking within your current instructional workflow will be an easy next step.
This session is as practical as it is conceptual. Come prepared to participate in a computational thinking activity yourself, and leave with a kit of instructional approaches and practical project ideas using online tools and devices such as little robots (that can be borrowed from the ATA Library) that will help you bring computational thinking into the mainstream conversations and activities within your classrooms and schools.
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Teachers, School-based Administrators, Instructional Coaches, Learning Coaches, Inclusive Learning Teachers
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