Ciphersoup

#csta2025 CSTA Greater Los Angeles meet-up this morning.

CSTA workshop participants holding yellow rubber ducks

Thank you to all the participants in the Cybersecurity #Unplugged workshop at #CSTA25, and congrats to everyone for freeing their ducks with excellent code cracking skills.

#CSed #TeamCompSci #releasethequacken

All this thanks to the great staff and volunteers at @csteachersorg.bsky.social!

I was there many years ago and was even able to talk to one of the women who operated the bombes. It's a lovely campus, too. Others told me a visit would just take a couple hours, but I spent a whole day there.

Usually only for a 'road trip', in which the journey is most of the point, or when moving house and needing to move the car. I drove 24h to see family, but stopped to sleep in the middle.

It's a 35 hour drive, but I'll take a plane to save time!

Just submitted my slides for #CSTA2025, right at the deadline. I'm so excited for this conference! Thanks, @csteachersorg.bsky.social for putting this on. See you in Cleveland!

#TeamCompSci #CSEd

This looks like so much fun! I want to combine this with some other e-textiles (circuits/LED) next year with my new middle school group.

#CSEd #physicalcomputing

To clarify, I teach mapping, filtering, aggregate operations (HS). I teach loops, but not really traditional for or while loops. Of what you listed, the only thing (I think) required by the K12 standards is loops, but they can be taught in different ways (e.g. 'until' is easier than 'while').

I don't want to get in the weeds of which algorithmic constructs are important, but I would say in regards to belonging, vector and aggregate operations are as much real CS as anything else, and I'd rather change focus on constructs than take sense of belonging from K12. (I teach them both, btw)

Thanks, got it! I don't see anything in it about vector operations, but regardless I think that overall the paper is coming from the premise of what I was saying before that cognitive load is reduced not from particular algorithmic constructs, but from matching the learner's level of abstraction.

What do you mean by "computing education for non-CS"? Non-CS what? I agree that programming is used in different ways, but your point in bringing up vector programming seemed to be that it was an example of 'not CS' and I disagree with that anyway.

That link doesn't work for me. Also, students in 5th grade tend to be 10 or 11 years old. A twelve year old would typically be starting grade 7 or ending grade 6.

It's not about the tools. It's about cognitive development and age appropriateness. I also am not a fan of a lot of the ways that CS is taught, but that doesn't detract from my view that a sense of belonging is important.

Bootstrap is not for K5. This type of abstraction is appropriate for algebra.

Yes, if students are already operating at a higher level of abstraction, using a function that reflects that level would be less cognitively demanding than moving between levels of abstraction and constructing the underlying behavior. But that's not a question of repeats versus vector operations.

My second point is that the very idea of operating in aggregate is going to be hard for K5, and it will need to be explained by having the students traverse the list by hand and construct a new list. It would not initially make sense to them to do it all at once. It's too abstract. (cont'd)

That's what I'm saying. If you compare using a loop to specifically do something that involves traversing a data structure in order to map an operation to all items, of course using a native mapping function will be easier. But that doesn't mean that mapping is easier than loops. (cont'd)

"• 1 + (1,2,3) evaluates to 2,3,4 • (1,2,3) + (2,3,4) evaluates to 3,5,7"

This paper doesn't appear to say that. It appears to say that if you want to map an operation or do an aggregate operation, it's easier to have native functionality to do that rather than to construct it with a loop. I doubt most K5 students would easily grasp below without explicit traversal.

Yes, totally agree that's an aim. I would also like to add that they should get what they need for personal fulfillment, too.

If that is the criticism, that you think it's too much to say that each student is an indispensable and integral part of how CS intersects with society, I think that's fair. I would like to know more about what the authors mean by 'indispensable'. The absence of one person won't collapse society.

But we don't start by saying 'you belong in CS' either. The idea is to create a curriculum that instills a sense of belonging, and to have that as an explicit goal that shapes the way we build courses.

Yes, that does not talk about enrolling in any courses, declaring a major, or choosing a career path. I'm talking about CS as a discipline that exists as part of general society, and whether all students feel belonging and agency within that aspect of our shared culture.

Can you explain more about how vector operations are easier for a K-5 student to learn than a repeat loop? I'm having a really hard time understanding what that would look like in a K-5 classroom. What makes it more useful to a child's goals?

I have a lot of thoughts on this, too much for BlueSky posts, but I do think that a lot of this has to do with the way we approach in K8. I would question the ultimate goal of having CS classes 'draw in a majority of students', and if there's a better way to reach that instead.

I didn't say that I didn't want them to value the class. I said that's not the main reason I want them to feel a sense of belonging.

I'm curious. If a student rejects literature and feels that reading isn't for them, is that something educators should accept, or is it a sign that we should change the way we teach it such that everyone feels a sense of belonging when it comes to this component of our culture?

I agree that computing classes aren't about recruitment or assimilation. I don't agree that they shouldn't generate a sense of belonging in CS. I think that you and I interpret the phrase "sense of belonging" differently, and it is important that the standards clarify what that means.

Can you clarify? I don't see how "going into CS" would mean "Not take classes in CS", so I think we crossed wires at some point. I still think that the computing that they need would be part of the computing of CS, but this may be a K12/higher ed divide. I'm talking about this in the context of K12.

Actually, I responded, but can you clarify what you mean by "going into CS"?

I don't think this is an either/or situation. I think that one supports the other, especially when the class incorporates diverse and authentic experiences with CS and highlights different forms of engagement in CS.