WEEK 7 COMPUTATIONAL THINKING

Your name: Rachel Siekkinen

My classroom in this activity would come from a majority of middle class families and attend a public
school. This lesson would take place in a third-grade classroom. There would be an equal amount of
girls and boys, mainly Caucasian but a significant number of African Americans, Asians, and Latinos.
The subject for this activity will be science, more specifically the example of deforestation and wildlife for
this activity.

Based on the definitions provided by this week and last week’s articles, along with the
examples on p. 52 of this week’s article, complete the chart below to provide specific
examples of how you would encourage CT and problem solving in your classroom.

CT Principle How you would define it How would it manifest in your

(in your own words) class

Identify a problem and collect or Students can identify the

Data Collection locate data that corresponds to
the problem.
Analyze the problem at hand to
Data Analysis gain understanding through
dissecting each layer, this can
be done through writing
programs to collect calculations
on a problem.
Representing data that connects
Data Representation with your topic through the forms
of graphs, charts, tables, lists,
etc.
Breaking the topic into more
Problem Decomposition manageable chunks to work with
in pieces instead of a whole.
Determine a way to create a
Abstraction solution for the problem using
problem of deforestation
affecting wildlife, looking up
statistical data for locations
before and affected
deforestation.
Students can look more in-depth
at deforestation, looking at the
causes and analyzing both the
pros and cons of the situation on
wildlife using a statistical means.
Students can graph populations
of specific animals affected by
deforestation or make a table of
wildlife population based on
country and animal.
Students could begin by
focusing on a specific region
and locating a specific forest
that is being affected. From here
they could create tables on the
wildlife found at this location,
including statistical data.
Create a model or organizer on
how to protect wildlife and ways
 steps and procedures that can
be applied to other problems as
well.
Determine a way to solve a
Algorithms and Procedures problem through a well-thought
out system of steps to solve the
problem at hand and then use
these steps for your problem.
The usage of online resources
Automation and tools to aid in finding a
solution to the problem.
Taking the different parts or
Parallelization pieces of a problem and dividing
them up so parts of the problem
can be worked on
simultaneously.
Applying the method on how you
Simulation solved the problem in a real-life
context.
to protect their habitats. This can
be applied to many different
functions going on around the
world that affect animals.
Students can create a step-by-
step procedure for moving
animals to a safer location,
redirecting deforestation, or
other solutions they see
feasible.
Through the use of interactive
models online students could
see the effects of deforestation
on the environment overtime,
project data that shows the
decrease in animal populations
and how it affects the food
chain, etc.
In groups students can divide up
the animals affected by
deforestation and individually
research and form data on their
animal before coming back
together as a group and sharing
their findings.
Students could write letters to
policy-makers including the data
and solutions found in their
problem-solving method, create
websites educating others about
how they too can help end this
problem, present problem at
town meetings, etc.