An Examination of Abstraction in K-12 Computer Science Education

Computer scientists have been working towards a common definition of abstraction; however, the instruction and assessment of abstraction remain categorically underresearched. Because abstraction is often cited as a component of computational thinking, abstraction has been summarily likened to a higher order thinking skill. A broad conceptual framework including philosophy, psychology, constructionism, and computational thinking was aligned with the descriptive qualitative design and guided the literature review and data analysis. This qualitative examination of how teachers determine curriculum, deliver instruction, and design assessments in K-12 computer science education provides insight into best practices and variables for future quantitative study. The instructional strategies, objectives, and assessments of twelve K-12 computer science teachers from 3 states were examined in this descriptive qualitative examination of instruction using thematic coding analysis. The majority of teachers had little to no professional development regarding teaching abstraction. All teachers in the study were unsure what student abstraction abilities should be according to grade level. Teachers\u27 understanding of abstraction ranged from very little knowledge to very knowledgeable. The majority of teachers did not actively assess abstraction. Teachers described successfully teaching abstraction through multiple instructional practices and spiraling curriculum. Practical descriptive insights illuminate additional variables to research the instruction of abstraction qualitatively and quantitatively, as well as provide anecdotal instructional successes

The Influence of Teacher Curricular Knowledge and Orientations to the Teaching and Learning of Science on Secondary Chemistry Curricula

Efforts to understand changes in teacher curricula following the adoption of reform-based standards, such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) remain incomplete and prior scholarship has identified several topics in the standards (e.g., nuclear chemistry and kinetics) that remain infrequently addressed in teachers’ introductory chemistry classes. This study provides an initial insight into how teachers decide what to teach, how they teach it, and why it might be valuable to include in their curriculum. To accomplish this, two teachers’ units on nuclear chemistry and kinetics were explored as part of a case study methodology. The research questions sought answers to help understand why some topics found in the standards remain marginalized in many teachers’ curricula while other topics receive extensive attention and coverage. Similarly, the study attempted to understand how teachers\u27 curricular knowledge and orientations to the teaching and learning of science influence their curricular decision-making process around the topics of nuclear chemistry and kinetics. Findings suggest that subject-matter knowledge as well as curricular knowledge plays a significant role in shaping how teachers understand a particular topic and what type of knowledge students should be developing. Both participants independently sought learning opportunities (e.g., professional development) to augment their subject-matter knowledge and curricular knowledge around a unit on nuclear chemistry but did not do so for a unit on chemical kinetics. Similarly, individual teachers’ orientations to the teaching and learning of science were generally consistent across the topics studied but differed greatly between the two participants. Both teachers also reported a desire to bring chemistry as it relates to the “real world” into their classes, though their understandings of what “real world” means differed significantly as did their subject-matter knowledge about each topic. For the goals underlying standards such as NGSS to be realized, further work must be done to understand barriers to implementation and for targeted professional development to be designed and offered to support those needs

The Other Culture: Science and Mathematics Education in Honors

TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface — Dail W. Mullins, Jr. Introduction — Ellen B. Buckner and Keith Garbutt Section I: What is Science in Honors? Chapter 1: One Size Does Not Fit All: Science and Mathematics in Honors Programs and Colleges — Keith Garbutt Chapter 2: Encouraging Scientific Thinking and Student Development — Ellen B. Buckner Chapter 3: Information Literacy as a Co-requisite to Critical Thinking: A Librarian and Educator Partnership — Paul Mussleman and Ellen B. Buckner Section II: Science and Society Chapter 4: SENCER: Honors Science for All Honors Students — Mariah Birgen Chapter 5: Philosophy in the Service of Science: How Non-Science Honors Courses Can Use the Evolution-ID Controversy to Improve Scientific Literacy — Thi Lam Chapter 6: Recovering Controversy: Teaching Controversy in the Honors Science Classroom — Richard England Chapter 7: Science, Power, and Diversity: Bringing Science to Honors in an Interdisciplinary Format — Bonnie K. Baxter and Bridget M. Newell Section III: Science and Mathematics in Honors for the Non-Science Student Chapter 8: Honors Science for the Non-Science-Bound Student: Where Have We Gone Wrong? — Bradley R. Newcomer Chapter 9: Engaging the Honors Student in Lower-Division Mathematics, Minerva Cordero, Theresa Jorgensen, and Barbara A. Shipman Chapter 10: Statistics in Honors: Teaching Students to Separate Truth from “Damned Lies” — Lisa W. Kay Chapter 11: Is Honors General Chemistry Simply More Quantum Mechanics? — Joe L. March Section IV: Science in Honors for the Science Student Chapter 12: Communicating Science: An Approach to Teaching Technical Communication in a Science and Technology Honors Program . — Cynthia Ryan, Michele Gould, and Diane C. Tucker Chapter 13: Designing Independent Honors Projects in Mathematics — Minerva Cordero, Theresa Jorgensen, and Barbara A. Shipman Chapter 14: Honors Senior Theses Are ABET Friendly: Developing a Process to Meet Accreditation Requirements — Michael Doran Section V: Interdisciplinary Approaches in Honors Science Curricula Chapter 15: Interdisciplinary Science Curricula in Honors — Dail W. Mullins, Jr. Chapter 16: The Science of Humor: An Interdisciplinary Honors Course — Michael K. Cundall, Jr. Chapter 17: An Interdisciplinary Understanding of a Disease: Project for an Honors-Embedded Biochemistry Course — Kevin M. Williams Section VI: Thinking like a Scientist: A Toolkit Chapter 18: Replacing Appearance with Reality: What Should Distinguish Science in an Honors Program? — Larry J. Crockett Chapter 19: Confronting Pseudoscience: An Honors Course in Critical Thinking — Keith Garbutt Chapter 20: Science Education: The Perils of Scientific Illiteracy, the Promise of Science Education — Glenn M. Sanford Acknowledgements — Ellen B. Buckner and Keith Garbutt About the Author