ABSTRACT

Background: A variety of self-directed opportunities to learn how to program are available to kids. But how do kids manage the motivational and cognitive challenges of creating projects?

Methods: I examined this question in the context of kids working at home with the Scratch programming environment, based on thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with 30 young creators discussing their project development processes.

Findings: Ten strategies were central to kids’ progress with their projects: experimenting, planning, compromising, persevering, taking a break, asking for help, studying projects, adapting projects, creating with others, and helping others learn. Drawing on structuration theory, which frames an individual’s purposeful actions as connected to the internal and external structures to which they have access, I recast these kids’ strategies as connected to three key structures—personal interests, access to others, and time—with both enabling and inhibiting effects.

Contribution: This study contributes to decades-long conversations about self-directed learning, offering a new view into the relationship between structure and self-direction by applying structuration theory to informal computer science learning. It offers a set of structures to consider when designing in support of self-direction, and acknowledges the prior problem-solving strategies that learners may bring to new areas of learning.

摘要

背景：孩子们可以利用各种自主学习编程的机会。但是孩子们如何应对创建项目的动机和认知挑战呢？

方法：我在使用 Scratch 编程环境在家工作的孩子的背景下研究了这个问题，基于对 30 位讨论他们项目开发过程的年轻创作者的半结构化访谈的主题分析。

结果：十项策略对孩子们的项目进展至关重要：试验、计划、妥协、坚持、休息、寻求帮助、研究项目、调整项目、与他人一起创造和帮助他人学习。借鉴结构化理论，该理论将个人的有目的的行为与他们可以访问的内部和外部结构相关联，我将这些孩子的策略重新定义为与三个关键结构相关联——个人兴趣、与他人的接触和时间——同时使能和抑制作用。

贡献：这项研究有助于长达数十年的关于自主学习的对话，通过将结构化理论应用于非正式的计算机科学学习，为结构和自主学习之间的关系提供了一个新的视角。它提供了一套在设计时要考虑的结构以支持自我指导，并承认学习者可能为新的学习领域带来的先前解决问题的策略。