Up until now, I have been focusing my research efforts on the barriers to data literacy and data analysis skills in the high school environment. I have realized that I am very interested in looking at teacher preparation, in addition to student outcomes. Since I am familiar with a high school setting, I thought it would be good to learn more about an elementary setting. Therefore, I’ve pivoted my research this past semester to focus on professional development needs and supports for elementary school teachers to meet New Jersey Computer Science Standards. In 2020, New Jersey adopted student learning standards for Computer Science and Design Thinking. These standards incorporate a broad range of computing concepts and core ideas including computing systems, data, engineering and design, algorithms and programming. A cursory review of my district’s K-5 curriculum shows that the curriculum has not been updated since 2019 and the current curriculum likely does not address the 2020 standards.
According to Yadav, et.al (2022), teacher development varies greatly across countries and within countries. All CS teachers need to have pedagogical, technology, and content knowledge to be effective, however there is a consistent challenge with recruiting candidates. If the requirements to become a CS teacher mirror those of a CS major, students often do not pursue teaching because of the possibility of better paying jobs. If the requirements for preservice teachers are “add on” requirements which necessitate more time and money for a student, the student often is hesitant to take on the additional coursework. In-service teachers who look to pursue alternate certification pathways for teaching CS often do not have access to high quality CS instruction, nor have they themselves experienced CS instruction.
Both Margulieux, et. al (2022) and Yadav, et. al. (2022) discuss updates to teacher preparation programs which I beleive is the path forward. For pre-service teachers, we need to embed computing into the core teacher education courses, across disciplines (not just as an “add on”). By incorporating CS/CT content knowledge into all levels of education, we will hopefully eliminate the “fear of computing”. dge into all levels of education to eliminate the “fear of computing”
For in service teachers, we need to develop PD which contains supports to develop CS skills over time (as opposed to a 1-2 week PD opportunity). Providing “team-teaching or co-teaching opportunities with experienced teachers who have deep CS knowledge” is critical to building the skills and confidence of in-service teachers. We need to have a multi-prong approach to addressing the lack of CS/CT knowledge in our K-12 education staff!