Maria Knobelsdorf, University of Dortmund, Germany - Didaktik der ...

of partnerships and cooperation models in order to diversify
educational opportunities. Since educational standards
must be met by all schools profiles are closely related to
context-oriented approaches.
Therefore for the evaluation of phase three we paid more
attention to the two profile teachers’ feedback. They reported
that the profile is very attractive for pupils from both
cooperating schools and even from other schools. Since 2010
when the profile was implemented, the number of pupils who
change schools because of the offered profile, has increased.
Both teachers explain the profile’s success by their cooperation
with external partners and the school projects:
” Ohne Euch hätten wir das nie geschafft.“
[Without you we would never have accomplished
this.]
” Unser Informatikprofil ist erfolgreich, es kommt
wieder eins zustande, auch Dank der tollen Angebote,
die wir durch Euch machen können.“ [Our
Profilkurs is successful: we can offer it again this
year thanks to the great opportunities we can
give due to your support.]
” Für uns ist es wichtig, dass die Projekte klein
genug sind für die Schule, aber dennoch mit praxisbezogenem
Hintergrund. [Das Projekt] hat die
Schüler unheimlich motiviert und es war in unser
Semester eingebettet.“ [For us it is important
that the school projects are small enough to be
practical at school, but at the same time reflect
a professional background. The pupils were very
motivated, and the project was well integrated in
the Profilkurs this school semester.]
However, the success of school courses doesn’t end with
the motivation of the pupils but with learning outcomes
which have to meet educational standards.
3.5 Phase 4: From input to outcome
For the first three project courses our process of bringing
contexts into the classroom essentially resembled a waterfall
model. It was only after the decontextualization was
completed that the recontextualization started: the school
project took place not before end of term. Our students
who developed context artifacts and teaching units had no
second opportunity to improve their products.
However, during the school projects we observed how the
pupils got along with the Greenfoot scenarios and gained
first-hand insights into how the context artifacts and the
teaching units fitted into the classroom context. The teachers
from the cooperation school who were temporarily replaced
by our students also gave valuable feedback. Moreover
the boys and girls developed their own ideas on how
to improve the software. Some of them even engaged in actively
implementing new features and thus created context
artifacts themselves. These results informed the requirements
for our next project course.
An additional aspect to be considered in the model is the
role of educational standards. In our school project educational
standards have been playing a minor role. But by
now a cooperation school had integrated some of our course
material into their curriculum. Since current educational
standards regulate content only to a minor degree and instead
focus on learning outcome, it was perfectly possible for
them to adapt our material to their courses. However in this
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case courses need to be aligned to educational standards.
Evaluation of phase 4.
The evaluation of phases four and five is object of further
research because it requires a comparison of learning outcomes
of both traditional Informatics courses and Informaticsin-context
courses, which is beyond our scope. But our
school projects are already producing results. There are
pupils who attended the first school projects in 2010 at the
age of 14 and who now chose the Profilkurs offered by our
cooperating school. And by now there are also pupils who
successfully finished the Profilkurs and enrolled for Informatics
or engineering degree programs.
3.6 Phase 5: Consolidation
Within the current fifth phase we have consolidated the
graphical representation of the suggested model in order to
communicate it to other researchers and practitioners. Furthermore
we want to discuss both the relevance of the model
and the choice of context. The current version is described
in the following section and illustrated in figure 5.
4. THE PROCESS MODEL
In the following we will describe our process model for
bringing contexts into the classroom along the lines of the
distinction of the pre-educational and the educational stages
(see 3.4). The model is shown in figure 5.
4.1 Pre-Educational Stage
At the pre-educational stage the real-world context is analyzed
with an essentially informatical stance. This stage is
characterized by the decontextualization of context artifacts
from their original context.
4.1.1 Decontextualization of Context Artifacts
The simplest instance of a context artifact is when a physical
artifact – e. g. a punch card – has lost its original meaning,
yet is still associated with a context. We call these
kind of context artifacts aboriginal or primary. Most artifacts
cannot simply be removed from their original context
though, and therefore must be mediated. Examples of
mediated or secondary context artifacts are photographs or
videos. However in order to understand the situated meaning
of activities and artifacts in a complex system, they need
to be fully decontextualized and reassembled. Instances for
these tertiary newly designed context artifacts are models or
simulations, and other objectifications.
As described above (3.1.2) decontextualization, i. e. formalization
and constructing artifacts, is usually one important
aspect of software development. The other is recontextualization,
i. e. implementation of the artifacts into the
context. In our model two contexts must be analyzed: the
real-world context and the classroom context. Thus the preeducational
stage is pre-educational in that educational purposes
are assumed in the decontextualization of context artifacts.
Yet for this activity an informatical stance might be
predominant.
4.1.2 Guiding Informatical Principles (GP)
The decontextualization is guided by fundamental informatical
principles because the artifacts are selected and developed
from an informatical point of view. Guiding principles
(GP) may be found in the Great Principles of Comput-