Perceptions of future basic education teachers about the potential of programming in the educational context

ABSTRACT

Besides the development of disciplinary skills, programming contributes to the development of abilities such as reasoning, problem solving and creativity. Therefore, it is fundamental that in the initial teachers training, programming is an integral part of the curricular unit programs of didactics. This will make it possible to contribute to the integration of programming in future teachers’ practices, in a way that should encourage them to promote the development of the skills listed above in their students. This article describes a study developed in the context of a higher education institution, with students of a master’s degree in teaching. This is a case study sought to understand the future teachers’ perceptions about the potential of programming, before and after attending a workshop about Scratch. The results suggest that future teachers have positive perceptions about the potential of programming in an educational context, which is likely to contribute to its integration into pedagogical practice. It was also found that the workshop contributed to changing the perceptions of these future teachers, namely those whose perceptions were not so favorable to the use of programming in and for learning.

KEYWORDS:

• Programming
• pedagogical practices
• initial teacher training

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work is funded by National Funds through the FCT - Foundation for Science and Technology, I.P., within the scope of the project Refª UIDB/05507/2020. Furthermore, we would like to thank the Centre for Studies in Education and Innovation (CI&DEI) and the Polytechnic of Leiria for their support. This work is also funded by DigiMedia centre and by national funds through FCT – Foundation for Science and Technology, I.P., under the project UIDB/05460/2020.