Open peer commentary on the article “Early Programming Education Based on Concept Building” by Jiří Vaníček. Abstract: Vaníček proposes a developed curriculum of basic programming informed by sound constructivist-based principles. Two questions for reflection are brought forth, one concerning the expected constructivist approach to teaching and one about the development of pupils’ computational perspectives.

Context: Computational thinking denotes the thinking processes needed to solve problems in the way computer scientists would. It is seen as an ability that is important for everybody in a society that is rapidly changing due to applications of computational technologies. More and more countries are integrating computational thinking into their school curricula. Problem: There is a need for more effective learning environments and learning methods to teach computational thinking principles to children of all ages. The constructionist approach seems to be promising since it focuses on developing thinking skills. Method: We extract and discuss insights from the target articles. Results: There are several learning initiatives and curricula that successfully apply constructionist learning to acquiring computational thinking skills. Implications: Computational thinking as a subject at school presents a chance to bring more constructionist learning to schools.

Key words: Computational thinking, concept building, constructionist learning, deconstructionism, learning environment, makerspace, microworlds, short tasks

The schema mechanism is a general learning and concept-building mechanism intended to simulate aspects of Piagetian cognitive development during infancy. A computer program that implements the schema mechanism, MARCSYST I, has replicated several early milestones in the Piagetian infant’s invention of the concept of permanent object. In Piaget’s constructivist theory, an infant first represents the world only in terms of simple sensory and motor elements; initially, there is no concept of persistent, external objects-objects that exist even when not perceived. The infant must construct this concept, working backward from the perceptions that manifest external objects. This conceptual leap is first of a long series of such constructions, extending through adult-level intelligence. The schema mechanism connects to a simulated body in a microworld. The mechanism learns from its experiences by processes of induction, abstraction, and invention. A novel induction technique builds schemas, each of which asserts that a given action, in certain contexts, has particular results; contexts and results are expressed in terms of binary state elements called items. Crucially, the schema mechanism not only thus discovers relations among existing representational elements (actions and items), but also constructs new such elements. For any achievable result, the mechanism can define a new, abstract action, the action of achieving that result. Most important, the mechanism can synthesize new state elements to designate aspects of the world that the existing repertoire of representations fails to express, thus inventing new concepts. The schema mechanism builds schemas, expressing the context-dependent results of actions, by an induction technique called marginal attribution. Discovering the results of actions is complicated by the fact that a particular action typically has different effects on different occasions. Until the corresponding context conditions have been identified, a result is therefore difficult to identify as such, and vice versa. The marginal attribution facility solves this chicken-and-egg problem by identifying a relevant state transition-one which, even if it follows a given action only rarely, is even more rare in the absence of the action. Then, the mechanism searches for conditions under which the relevant result follows more reliably. The schema mechanism can define a new state element to represent the validity conditions of an unreliable schema. For example, suppose a given schema asserts that moving the hand to a certain body-relative position results in a tactile sensation. The schema mechanism defines a new state element to represent whatever unknown condition must hold for the schema to be valid; in this case, the condition is that there be a palpable object at that position. The concept of palpable objects is not built in; rather, this synthetic item itself implements the mechanism’s first approximation to that concept, thus reifying the schema’s validity conditions, treating the schema’s validity as a thing-in-itself. Having defined a new state element, the mechanism begins an open-ended process of finding the element’s verification conditions, which tell about its state.

Open peer commentary on the article “Early Programming Education Based on Concept Building” by Jiří Vaníček. Abstract: Vaníček’s target article presents a pilot study of an introductory course of programming. In my commentary I argue that teachers will be a key factor of success if the pilot program is implemented in a top-down way. Other important issue are the differentiation between children with different abilities while they go through the tasks, and the continuation of learning programming after the entry-level course.

Open peer commentary on the article “Early Programming Education Based on Concept Building” by Jiří Vaníček. Abstract: I put the proposed approach to learning programming against the place of programming in the curriculum of computer science, e.g., as introduced in Poland. Then I comment on some drawbacks of focusing mainly on programming when developing concepts that belong to much wider areas.

Abstract: Programming is more a tool for pupil development than an educational goal. A description of the context of the creation of the textbook for programming could help to answer some questions leading us too far astray from the theory of concept-building programming education described in my article.

Context: The main context of this study is the shift of programming education from professional development to general education. Problem: The article deals with methods, environments and approaches to teaching programming to everyone. Method: Conceiving programming education as concept building by creating pupils’ mental models in selected didactical environments that are constructed to allow pupils to focus on the given problem and, at the same time, to have the structure of a set of similar short tasks of increasing difficulty with the same underlying concept. Design-based research on the evaluation of curricular materials created according to this method. Results: Specified principles of creation of appropriate materials for teaching programming, intervention conducted with these materials and experience from a pilot research study of teaching that contains signals of how difficult it would be to change teachers’ minds to make them willing to accept and implement this approach in their teaching. Implications: The article focuses on applying the theory from mathematics education to a different field. The results could be beneficial for programming curricula education creators; a qualitatively new generation of textbooks on programming education for pupils from an early age could be created using this approach. Future research could focus on teachers’ beliefs and the changes to these beliefs when teaching programming in this way. Constructivist content: The theory used has its origin in mathematical constructivism and is based on the work of Papert and Hejn. It could bring experience in applying a proven theory originally used in another discipline. Key words: Computer science, programming education, junior high school, concept building, Scratch.

Open peer commentary on the article “Early Programming Education Based on Concept Building” by Jiří Vaníček. Abstract: The Scratch environment can be used to professionally design tasks for computer science education in schools. Working on tasks touching different facets of one and the same programming concept can help pupils to build up universal mental models. A problem is how to make this type of learning experience relevant for young people.