Teaching computational thinking in K-12 as a 21th century skill is becoming increasingly important. Computational thinking describes a specific way of reasoning building on concepts and processes derived from algorithms and programming. One way to teach these concepts is games as an effective and efficient alternative. This article presents SplashCode, a low-cost board game to reinforce basic algorithms and programming concepts. The game was developed in a systematic way following an instructional design process, and applied and evaluated in a Brazilian public school with a total of 65 students (grade 5 to 9). First results indicate that the game can have a positive impact on motivation, learning experience, and students’ learning, as well as contribute positively to social interaction, relevance, and fun. Results of this study may assist in the selection of games as an instructional strategy and/or in the development of new games for teaching computational thinking.

中文翻译：

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SplashCode-用于学习中学算法的棋盘游戏

将K-12中的计算思维作为一种21世纪的技能进行教学变得越来越重要。计算思维描述了基于从算法和编程派生的概念和过程进行推理的特定方式。教授这些概念的一种方法是将游戏作为一种有效的替代方法。本文介绍了SplashCode，这是一种低成本的棋盘游戏，用于强化基本算法和编程概念。该游戏是按照指导性设计过程以系统的方式开发的，并在总共65名学生（5至9年级）的巴西公立学校中进行了应用和评估。初步结果表明，该游戏可以对动机，学习经历和学生的学习产生积极影响，并为社交互动，相关性和娱乐性做出积极贡献。