DEVELOPING COMPUTATIONAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH PROGRAMMING USING COMMAND CARDS WITH THE UNPLUGGED CODING BOARD GAME FOR GRADE 2 STUDENTS

Abstract

The objectives of this research article are: (1) To develop programming skills using command cards with the Unplugged Coding board game.  (2) To study the results of improving programming skills using command cards with the Unplugged Coding board game for Grade 2 students.  The participants were 18 Grade 2 students from a small school in Phichit Province, studied during the first semester of the academic year 2023. The tools used in this research included a lesson plan for programming with command cards, a reflective learning approach, activity logs, and an assessment form for computational thinking skills. The study was conducted using an action research methodology with three action cycles. Data were analyzed using content analysis and triangulation to ensure reliability in methods and data sources.

Findings:

(1) Regarding the first objective, the development of computational thinking skills related to material properties involved four steps: 1) Introduction: Teachers used guiding questions to encourage students to describe and analyze the steps of their eating routines. 2)

Learning Activities: Students practiced programming by using the board game to guide animal characters in completing assigned missions. 3) Knowledge Expansion: Groups of students explained their commands, recorded the correct commands, and discussed them collaboratively. 4) Summary: Students wrote on Post-it notes to categorize materials according to the given tasks.

(2) Regarding the second objective, the level of computational thinking skills demonstrated during the learning activities aligned with the post-learning skills, achieving a Level 4 transfer (near transfer) according to the computational thinking skill framework.