Abstract
To date, there is no known research examining children’s early coding skills in relation to an AR app and little is known about the types of creativity and creative thinking made possible by children’s engagement with coding apps. This chapter reflects on a study concerning four to six year old children’s engagement and learning with the Augmented Reality (AR) coding application Little Red Coding Club. Four case studies, involving thirty children, were conducted in South Yorkshire (UK) early years settings. Video data were multimodally analysed in relation to The Makerspace Learning Assessment Framework (MLAF) and The Early Coding Skills and Knowledge Framework (ECSKF) (Scott F, Marsh J. Young children’s engagement and learning with the Augmented Reality (AR) coding app ‘Little Red Coding Club’. University of Sheffield. https://content.twinkl.co.uk/document/general/twinkl-childrens-learning-with-ar-fnl-28-10-19_1578567254.pdf, 2019). Creative thinking and behaviours were assessed by mapping the MLAF against the A–E Framework of creativity (Murcia K, Pepper C, Joubert M, Cross E, Wilson S. Issues Edu Res 30(4):1395–1417. http://www.iier.org.au/iier30/murcia2.pdf, 2020). Both the affordances of the application (‘place’) and pedagogy of adults (‘person’) were considered. Children were enabled to be creative when equipped with both technical understanding of the conventions of coding and provided with contexts conducive to ‘freeplay’ and the production of their own digital texts and artefacts. Children exhibited many creative skills in their solo or peer engagement with the app. However, other creative skills required suitable pedagogical intervention from an adult.
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- 1.
For more information, see https://www.twinkl.co.uk/apps
- 2.
In the UK, early years practitioner denotes an individual who works with children under the age of five in any early years setting.
- 3.
In the UK, early years settings are educational care settings for children under the age of 5.
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Scott, F. (2022). Young Children’s Playful Engagement and Learning with a Fairy-Tale Themed Augmented Reality Coding App. In: Murcia, K.J., Campbell, C., Joubert, M.M., Wilson, S. (eds) Children’s Creative Inquiry in STEM. Sociocultural Explorations of Science Education, vol 25. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-94724-8_19
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