Developing preschool children's computational thinking with educational robotics: The role of cognitive differences and scaffolding

Abstract

The development of computational thinking is as important as writing, reading and arithmetic, and, it should start as early as kindergarten (Wing, 2008). However, little has been done in terms of investigating the factors influencing the development of computational thinking in preschool education (Bers et al., 2014; Ching et al., 2018; Kazakoff et al., 2013; Sullivan et al., 2013). Accordingly, the study herein investigated how young children's computational thinking could be developed using the Bee-Bot and two scaffolding techniques, while children's field-dependence/independence (FDI) was taken into consideration. The study has practical significance for classroom teachers, as they can use the results of this research to integrate the teaching of computational thinking skills in their lessons.