ICT-Rich Programming Projects

Abstract

This contribution advocates designing programming lessons in a way that students use information and communication technology (ICT) extensively. The paper presents four examples of such ICT-rich programming projects with different levels of required programming expertise: 1) Write directions for walking from one place to another using Google Maps and Streetview; 2) Develop a Python program that creates a text using words and phrases from free literature; 3) Write a program that creates a list of words representing controversial issues from automatically generated interview transcripts; and 4) Create a program that analyses a comma-separated values (csv) file with the results of a self-made Google Forms survey. The examples illustrate benefits of the combination of ICT and programming: students discover new ICT functionality and get a deeper understanding of digital technology. They experience that programming knowledge empowers uses of digital technology in new ways. Having the opportunity to use ICT tools may motivate teenagers to go deeper into computer science.