Colorado School of Mines, in collaboration with the National Center for Women & Information Technology at the University of Colorado, will implement and evaluate Computer Science (CS) Unplugged activities at five middle schools in the Jefferson County Public Schools district. CS Unplugged activities are designed to engage students in computational thinking activities without using computers. Many in the CS community hypothesize that the absence of a computer and the social of the Unplugged activities make CS Unplugged especially engaging for female and under-represented minority students who tend to have less experience and confidence with computing concepts. But what is the impact of Unplugged on students? Using pre- and post-surveys and learning assessments the project team will explore a number of questions to assess the impact of Unplugged activities on students. For example, does participation in CS Unplugged activities actually have a positive impact on students' interest (especially women and underrepresented minorities) in pursuing computing as a major or career? Can exposure to CS concepts in a more accessible format (i.e., with no computers) increase students' confidence that they are able to learn the fundamentals required to continue in the field? In addition to evaluating the impact on students, the project team will explore how to effectively incorporate CS Unplugged activities in a middle-school classroom, and how to encourage middle school teachers to include CS Unplugged activities and CS concepts in their classroom instruction.
Many K-12 school students have had limited exposure to computing concepts, and therefore, have a very poor understanding of what computing education and careers involve. To address this lack of knowledge, an international community of CS Unplugged contributors has developed activities to illustrate the kind of thinking that is expected of a computer scientist. CS Unplugged activities involve problem solving to achieve a goal, and engage students via kinesthetic activities, games, magic tricks, and competitions. Studies have shown that middle school is where students' interest in computing deteriorates; thus, this project will extend CS Unplugged activities with career information and then assess the impact of the Unplugged activities in the largest school district in Colorado with significant student diversity.
