Preliminary Experiences Towards an Inclusion of Dramatists - Teach Logic with Language

Abstract

With the ongoing process of digitalisation, it is undoubtedly necessary to integrate informatics as a compulsory part of school education. Assuming that not all groups of pupils will become familiar with the concepts of informatics easily, two questions arise: What types of pupils can be identi ed with regard to the learning of informatics and how can motivation and learning success of pupils with lower participation be increased? From literature we identi ed a way to classify two types of pupils' play styles: dramatists and patterners. For dramatists, social interaction seems to be the key to motivation and learning success, while patterners follow a more structured, straight-forward and planned approach. In our preliminary study in our teaching-learning-lab, dramatists were, in opposite to patterners, signi cantly more motivated when a coding task involved a story or social interaction. Further research is aimed at investigating the e ects of di erent workshop settings on the motivation of these two learning types for an equal involvement of both groups.

Keywords

• Learning-styles
• Motivation
• Participation

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One of the reasons why students show di erent interests and motivation for informatics, is probably due to their personal prior experiences with computers [ 7 ]. There has also been a lot of work in the eld of gender distribution in connection with informatics at school (e.g. [ 3 ]). Even though, pupils' coding-related skills are not necessarily related to the gender, pupils still own di erent characteristics in the way they choose an approach for solving problems in informatics. This is possibly also related to the di erent early childhood education of girls and boys. Another distinction is also described by Papert, who mentions di erent aptitudes of either for language or logic and that based on these individual characters, the development of interest in the opposite skill can be mobilized [ 4 ]. Related research on the distinction of learners' characteristics was identi ed in childplay, where two types of players as object-independent and object-dependent were identi ed and named dramatists and patterners [ 2, 8, 9 ]). Dramatists show strong interest in human surroundings and favour socio-dramatic play with for example stu ed animals. Mitchel Resnick stated that these two types of styles are not limited to early childhood education but can be observed at all ages. Moreover, the patterners are preferred to the dramatists in science education which again can be one of the reasons for less interest among some groups of students towards these subjects [ 5 ]. Furthermore, in [ 6 ] it is described, that it is possible to introduce robotics activities in a more appealing way for dramatists. As for dramatists social interaction seems to be the key to motivation and learning success, patterners follow a more structured and planned approach.

The remainder of this work is structured as follows: First, the two play styles of dramatists and patterners are described in more detail. Then we present the research questions, followed by the planned workshop setting. We conclude this paper with some insights into the rst experiences we have had and a look at possible further research. 2

Dramatists and Patterners

In Lifelong Kindergarten [ 5 ] Resnick associates play styles of dramatists and patterners with students' attitudes towards learning informatics. He explains the di erent approaches of both play styles using an example: In one workshop, primary school children were to work with LEGO robot kits. The patterners immediately started working on a project and had an impressive result after a short period of time. The dramatists instead started a project but interrupted their work shortly after the start to rst invent a framework story. They only nished their project when the storyline was satisfactory. Still, the result of dramatists was as sophisticated as the object of the patterners, but it took signi cantly longer. If the workshop had ended earlier, the group of dramatists would not have nished their project and would not have achieved a result in the goals of the workshop. Resnick further explains that these di erent interaction preferences can be observed among learners of all ages and adds a similar example from university context. He also points out that not taking play styles into account can lead to a negative attitude towards science for dramatists, when classes are designed only for patterners 3

Research Question

Resnick's experiences with the workshops for primary school pupils may not be transferred directly to workshops of our teaching-learning lab for secondary school pupils. Nevertheless, we are interested to what extent the play styles of dramatists and patterners can be taken into account in order to improve motivation and learning success in informatics. In order to examine the di erences between dramatists and patterners and to make a choice of which measures are appropriate for the corresponding groups, we plan to conduct and evaluate workshops with di erent social interactions in our teaching-learning laboratory. Considering this, our overall objective is, to design workshops for our teachinglearning-lab to involve dramatists and patterners equally aimed at increasing motivation and learning success in informatics education. In doing so, we rst identify 7th grade pupils' learning types as dramatists or patterners and based on that, we design a workshop. In this paper we share preliminary results of our observations. 4

Workshop Setting

The workshop Algorithmic Thinking lasts 90 minutes and is conducted with 7th grade students. The students' tendency towards the dramatist or patterners is determined by means of a survey which resulted in a random mixture of dramatists and patterners. The focus of the workshop was to teach students the concept of algorithms and to improve the ability to solve problems. At the beginning of the workshop we introduced robots contextualized with socially relevant topics and made comparisons with playful models. In our workshop we use Sphero Minin and SPRK+ robots, which can be programmed with the Sphero EDU environment that supports block programming. In the main part of the workshop we used both "unplugged" methods and "plugged" programming [ 1 ]. The rst part of the workshop, the unplugged phase, was based on the ideas of Papert [ 4 ], in which the students walked through the room and made drawings to learn programming. Since our goal was to include more social interaction, we adapted the idea and let a pupil play the well-known "turtle". Thus, in our workshop situation, the students split into pairs, one student plays the programmer and the other the robot. The pupils de ned a task, e.g. guiding the partner through the room or having a simple picture drawn. For programming, the programmer arranged magnetic blocks on a board on which commands such as "Take a step to the left" or "Draw a line up" are written. The blocks look similar to the blocks in the block programming language. The execution was done by the student robot. The team then compared whether the action was performed correctly and, if necessary, modi ed misleading commands. Through these activities, the pupils were introduced to the basics of block programming and debugging in a haptic and social way, without being distracted by the advanced functionality of a real development environment on a computer. Furthermore, the students either developed a basic idea of algorithmic thinking or moved towards a deeper understanding and experimented with variables and functions. Subsequently a simple real robot and a software as development environment were presented. After the students gained pro ciency in controlling the robot, they were asked to continue with challenges in which the robot performs di erent tasks, for example rolling through a maze. The students could choose a task of their choice and work alone or in pairs. The tasks varied in di culty and learning guides were available to support the students in their learning. 5

First results of the preliminary study

The rst tests were conducted with four girls, which were identi ed as dramatists by long term observation. The pupils volunteered to take part in the project within a free playing time. The unplugged programming part rather met the 'pattern style'. Nevertheless, the dramatists were surprisingly committed. They enjoyed designing a simple picture, programming it and watching the partner's drawing progress. For the "plugged"-part, we provided a programmable ball in the size of a golf ball as robot and simple programming tasks that they could solve with the knowledge from the unplugged part. The students spent some time with it but were not so enthusiastic anymore after a while. They explained that the robot should perform a real task, such as cleaning up the oor. We decided to let them create their own task using available materials like paper, pens and barriers. Very patiently they drew a nice labyrinth on a ipchart and added obstacles. When the labyrinth was nished and the robot was ready to be programmed, they lost interest. It was illuminating that the students were very motivated about the unplugged programming part, but then lost interest in the plugged part, although the structure of the tasks were very similar. As a consequence, we changed the tasks and added a social component. We let them play the game 'cat and mouse', where one robot is supposed to catch the other, using block programming. In this game, two pupils sit opposite each other in front of a framed, square meter area. The area holds various obstacles. One pupil has a golf ball sized robot (Sphero Mini) which plays the mouse and the other has a baseball sized robot (Sphero SPRK+), which plays the cat. Both robots can be programmed using block techniques. The cat is supposed to catch the mouse by touching it and the mouse is supposed to ee into the `mouse hole represented by a at circle. The pupils are allowed to execute a limited amount of commands in a row. Now the emphasis was on playing with a real person and the programming was just the tool. In this setting the pupils were much more motivated in carrying out the task. 6

Further Research

In the preliminary study the dramatists were signi cantly more motivated when the programming task involved social interaction. The study was carried out with a small number of test persons and therefore only gives a rst impression. However, the initial results indicate that more investigations are worthwhile. Therefore, further research is needed to investigate the e ects of di erent workshop settings on the motivation on pupils with di erent play styles. 7

Acknowledgement

This work was supported by the Vector Foundation.

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