Hello Class!
I just read the the ISTE article called "Computational Thinking: A Digital Skill for Everyone" by David Barr, John Harrison and Leslie Conery. Honestly, I felt like it didn't make it clear what computational thinking is. I even read it to my girlfriend, who is much smarter than me, and she didn't know either. Her comment actually was: "it just sounds like scientific thinking to me." Since both of us have studied science, it doesn't sound like anything new to us. It just sounds like the way humans should learn how to think about subjects. It's pretty much what gave us everything that makes life possible. Maybe not what makes life worth living, but definitely possible. Her next comment was: "it's like asking students to think outside the box." I think it's the exact opposite. It's asking students to look and see clearly exactly what's in the box. Is it possible that the coddling of our young has lead to a couple of generations of Americans that are only concerned with how they feel about a given subject? Our highly individualistic society inherently promotes "out of the box" thinking, as in: "how does this subject relate to me and my friends?" It's no wonder Americans have a hard time grasping what's happening in the Middle East. It has no bearing on their immediate consumerist existence. No wonder America has a shortage of engineers and computer programmers. Analyzing raw data doesn't "feel" very good. This, to me, is essentially the scientific community at large striking back. They did some research and analyzed the data. It's like when they re-branded Creationism "Intelligent Design". This is Logical or Critical Thinking re-branded Computational Thinking. I think. Either that or I don't get it at all. Why do they put the words modeling and simulation in quotes? Are they being ironic? Scientists don't put those words in quotes. And how does modeling and simulation relate to the lifestyle of an ancient roman child? It's all a bit too vague; the exact opposite of what computational thinking should yield. It's as if they didn't apply computational thinking to the writing of the article itself.
Cheers!
Andy
Hi Andy,
ReplyDeleteYour posts always make me smile because they are wonderfully coated with irony and common sense. I walk away from reading your posts thinking, "duh! what he said!" You are not afraid to challenge popular ideas and agreements - isn't that the best computational thinking? Taking, as you say, "what's in the box" shaking it up, and analyzing the meaning, structure, background, history, and ideas behind the hype. Bravo. You're a computational thinking superstar. And, you're not afraid to say, "Either that or I don't get it at all." It sounds like many people in the education community are trying to "get it" too. So, you're not alone. You may be one of the best people to help figure it out.
Best,
Dawn
Hey Andy,
ReplyDeleteI have to say...I completely agree with what Dawn says above. Andy is never afraid to challenge a popular idea and definitely never one to agree for the sake of agreeing -- which is awesome. I too felt similar when reading the article about computational thinking. Overall, the whole concept is still pretty vague to me and I think many people have the same issue. Teachers are having trouble implementing it into classroom curriculum because the concept isn't really clear cut and there is no definition or defined parameters. There is a still a lot of ironing out to do before we will see computational thinking in more classrooms.
Vince Riedel