Programming in School

Abstract

In this article, the development of the Swedish informatics curriculum during the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s is studied and described. The study's design is inspired by the curriculum theory presented by Lindensjö and Lundgren [2000], who suggest using the concept of arenas (the arenas of enactment, transformation and realisation) when discussing curriculum development. Data collection in this study comprises activities and actors in the arenas of enactment and transformation. Collected data include contemporary articles, journals, reports, booklets, government documents and archived documents. Findings show that informatics education in Sweden evolved from primarily focusing on programming knowledge related to automatic data processing and offered exclusively in vocational education (the 1960s and 1970s) to later (early 1980s) being introduced in the upper secondary school curriculum under the heading Datakunskap. The enactment of the informatics curriculum in 1983 encompassed programming, system development and computing in relation to applied sciences and civics. Mathematics teachers did much of the experimental work. It is shown that the competencies of upper secondary school teachers at the time rarely corresponded to the demands of the subject (content knowledge, resources and pedagogical skills). Stereotypical examples were therefore developed to support teachers in instructing about the subject content. When implemented in the theoretical natural science-programme, system development/systemisation was transformed into a twofold issue, comprising vocational attributes and societal aspects of computer programming. The implementation of today's informatics education, including programming in the curriculum, should draw from lessons learned from history. For a successful outcome, this study emphasises the necessity to understand 1) the common incentives for introducing computer programming in the curriculum, 2) the requirement for teachers' pedagogical content knowledge and 3) the stakeholders' role in the curriculum development process.

Education in Programming and Mathematical Learning: Functionality of a Programming Language in Educational Processes

“…To do this, we implemented a project in mathematics using Scratch and assessed its effects via a pre-and post-test with an experimental group and a control group, using a test battery to assess mathematical competence. Education in programming needs to be integrated into schools [55,56], and the schools' current situations need to be assessed to facilitate their decisions about whether to include it [57,58]. It is essential to generalize research in order to assess whether it works and what its effects are; there are examples pursuing this goal [59,60], a goal that is shared by our study.…”

“You give a little bit more love to animals than to robots”: primary pupils’ conceptions of ‘programming’ and programmable artefacts

“…In the late 1970s and early 1980s, informatics education, which included teaching about computers as well as learning programming, was established in many countries including Sweden (Heintz et al, 2017;Rolandsson, 2012Rolandsson, , 2019Rolandsson & Skogh, 2014) In the Swedish curriculum for compulsory schooling from 1980 (Lgr 80), CS was introduced in the subject mathematics in years 7-9. The focus in Lgr 80 was the computer, which was highlighted from three different perspectives: democracy, working life, and as a tool in teaching.…”

The Integration of Programming in Swedish School Mathematics: Investigating Elementary Mathematics Textbooks

“…Computers were introduced as digital tools, but came with many obstacles. They were large and required a lot of power, and programming languages were quite demanding, so coding was introduced only to some students and mainly at upper secondary level (Rolandsson, 2019). Although early enthusiasts saw programming as a problem-solving tool, reality turned it into a struggle with syntax during the 1990 ′ s. Computer knowledge was removed from the syllabus in the next revision 1994, and did not reappear until 2018 as digital competence and programming.…”