Design and evaluation of a braided teaching course in sixth grade computer science education

Abstract

We report on the design and evaluation of the first year of a Computer Science course in lower secondary education that implements the concept of braided teaching. Besides being a proof-of-concept, our study demonstrates that students an indeed be taught Computer Science (as opposed to Information and Communication Technology) as early as in sixth grade while at the same time not falling behind with respect to Information Technology Literacy. We present quantitative and qualitative results and argue that Computer Science can be taught just like any other science subject worth full curriculum credit. © 2012 ACM.