Programming takes place on a computer, but research has shown the promise of using non-programming activities for teaching important concepts to novice learners. The study, conducted by Grover et al at three urban US schools, was designed with 16 non-programming activities during a 20-day programme. The research team found that the learning gains from students who followed the intervention were significantly higher, in comparison to students who followed the regular computer science curriculum.
You can read the full blog post in Hello World issue 10 here. For the original research article, see.
Thom Kunkeler 