Project Dates: 2017-2019
A review of the literature and voices from the field of CS education
In 1967, Seymour Papert, Cynthia Solomon, and Wally Feurzeig created the LOGO computer language, the first ever designed for children—an event widely considered as the beginning of CSEd. It has taken a few decades to enter the educational mainstream, but the largest and most ambitious implementations of CSEd have now started to roll out. With this widening acceptance of CSEd comes an overwhelming demand from school systems for research-based knowledge and implementation guidelines, especially for K–8 schools.
To help meet this demand, the report Pre-College Computer Science Education: A Survey of the Field was commissioned to better understand what we know—and what we don’t know—about how children learn to program, the ways in which CSEd furthers the aims of public education, and how to chart a path to address imminent challenges.
It examines current research literature and integrates interviews with 14 leading researchers in the field to better define the knowns and unknowns with regard to the state of the CSEd field in relation to our understanding of student learning and the research opportunities that exist or that might be created to ensure fruitful and sustained advancement for all students.
Three major data sources were used for the report: (1) a review of all foundational works in the field, and existing literature reviews, (2) interviews, and (3) analysis of papers and resources recommended by interviewees.
This work also resulted in a chapter on the Cambridge Handbook on Computing Education Research.