January 2012 Volume 15 Number 1 - Educational Technology ...

Lin, J. M.-C., & Liu, S.-F. (2012). An Investigation into Parent-Child Collaboration in Learning Computer Programming.
Educational Technology & Society, 15 (1), 162–173.
An Investigation into Parent-Child Collaboration in Learning Computer
Programming
Janet Mei-Chuen Lin and Shu-Fen Liu 1
Graduate Institute of Information and Computer Education, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan //
1 National Lo-Tung Commercial Vocational High School, Yi-Lan County, Taiwan // mjlin@ntnu.edu.tw //
liu504@ms22.hinet.net
ABSTRACT
A multi-case study approach was used in this study to investigate how parents and children collaborated with
each other when they learned to program in MSWLogo together. Three parent-child pairs were observed directly
in a five-day computer camp. Each pair was assigned a total of 33 programming tasks to work on. The
observation focused on how parents interacted with their children while they tried to solve the tasks together.
Findings from this study indicated that, despite different patterns of interactions exhibited in the three pairs,
parent-child collaboration in programming naturally fell into a special form of “pair programming” in which the
parent and the child in each pair took the roles of “the reviewer” and “the driver” respectively. As such, children
wrote programs in a more systematic and disciplined manner instead of resorting to trial-and-error and tinkering;
children spent more time on analysis and design which were considered essential to successful problem solving;
the programs they produced were more compact, well-structured, and contained fewer errors. Moreover,
children tended to reflect on their solutions more often than if they learned alone. The interviews conducted after
the camp revealed that the participating parents and children alike found great pleasure in learning to program
collaboratively. In addition, the parents felt that the collaboration enabled them to gain a better understanding of
their children and develop a closer parent-child relationship.
Keywords
Parent-child collaboration, Computer programming, Logo, Pair programming
Introduction
The presence of computers in households around the world has changed family dynamics, especially with regard to
parent-child relationships. As Papert (1996) has pointed out, the comfort that the younger generations have with
computers has made children more independent of their parents in their exploration of the world. He suggested that
parents should spend more time trying to find good family computer projects to do together with their children and
“use the children’s enthusiasm for computers as a basis for enhancing the family’s learning culture” (p.79). Margolis
and Fisher (2002) also emphasized that “parents impart their computer enthusiasm and skills to their children, and
through early mastery acquired at home children gain a competence and confidence they carry with them into
school” (p.20).
In addition to playing computer games, surfing the net, making a multimedia show, and doing other activities using
off-the-shelf application packages, computer programming may be a more educational task that parents may do
together with their children. In an attempt to assess the effects of learning computer programming on the cognitive
style of 18 1 st -graders, Clements & Gullo (1984) concluded that computer programming can increase some aspects of
problem-solving ability, including reflectivity, divergent thinking, metacognitive ability, and the ability to describe
directions. Programming can also provide parents with a window into a child’s mind because a program has
imbedded in it the child’s concepts, strategies, and styles, which could only be the product of the child’s mind
(Valente, 1995). When children are engaged in the process of programming, they cycle through the steps of
“description-execution-reflection-debugging-description” repeatedly. These steps, particularly the debugging
activity, help a child to construct knowledge and learn about problem-solving strategies (Valente, 1995). According
to Ellinger (2003), the programming experience is profoundly educational for most people because programming is
meticulous; programming teaches self-criticism and responsibility; programming is creative; and programmers
communicate, collaborate and share.
Over the past decades many programming languages and environments have been developed that are intuitive and
can be easily learned by both children and adults who have no previous programming experience. Notable examples
include Alice (http://www.alice.org/), Lego Mindstorms (http://mindstorms.lego.com/), various versions of Logo
(http://www.logofoundation.org), Pico Crickets (http://www.picocricket.com/), Scratch (http://www.scratch.mit.edu),
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