Learning Programming with Robots: A Study on Students' Participation in a Virtual Community of Practice

Abstract

Nowadays, students learn from the world through a variety of physical and virtual spaces. As one of the priorities of the 21st century is to develop capacities associated with computational thinking and digital literacy, the use of robots in the teaching of programming is becoming more and more usual, since it promotes the development of problem solving, communication and teamwork skills. The purpose of this paper is to analyse and discuss the concept of participation in a virtual community created for the learning of programming with robots. Based on the situated learning theory and the underlying concepts of communities of practice, as well as the effects of technology thereon, we seek a better understanding of learning in these virtual spaces.

A scoping review on the relationship between robotics in educational contexts and e-health

“…At this school level, we found two papers targeting two opposite student types: Díaz-Lauzurica and Moreno-Salinas (2019) addressed the intervention to students with apathy and demotivation to develop a methodology to teach robots that can also engage this category of students; Sen et al (2021) to gifted and talented students to construct a robot able to solve Rubik's cube and promote creative and original thinking. Santos and Lopes (2020) presented the creation of a virtual community (DROIDE), while students in secondary school used LEGO Mindstorms, a multilanguage programming platform, and eight problems between Mathematics and Informatics to solve.…”