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Early Lessons from Evaluation of Computer Science Teacher Professional Development in Google’s CS4HS Program

Published: 26 August 2017 Publication History

Abstract

This article compares self-reported learning gains and experiences of teachers in four professional development courses funded through Google’s 2014 Computer Science for High School program. The courses were designed and taught independently at four universities and started late enough in the year to participate in our pre-post study. Two of the courses used a face-to-face approach, one was online only, and one used a hybrid format. Analyses from 314 pre-surveys and 129 post-surveys indicate CS teachers are far from homogenous, suggesting that some customization may benefit professional development. We also saw a stronger sense of community in the two face-to-face courses. Among the outcomes we measured, teacher concerns (Hall and Hord 1977) were more sensitive to change than our measures of self-efficacy, outcome expectations, readiness, or beliefs. Findings illustrate the variety of CS teacher professional development experiences and the need to study the best ways to scale effective CS teacher education.

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    Published In

    cover image ACM Transactions on Computing Education
    ACM Transactions on Computing Education  Volume 17, Issue 4
    December 2017
    123 pages
    EISSN:1946-6226
    DOI:10.1145/3134765
    Issue’s Table of Contents
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

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    Association for Computing Machinery

    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 26 August 2017
    Accepted: 01 March 2017
    Revised: 01 March 2017
    Received: 01 January 2016
    Published in TOCE Volume 17, Issue 4

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    Author Tags

    1. K12 education
    2. attitudes
    3. hybrid learning

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