Student-Centered Computing: Teacher Experiences in a New Introductory Computer Science Curriculum

Objectives. The goal of this paper is to introduce and describe a new introductory computer science course. Research results from the implementation of this curriculum will be presented to demonstrate the nature of teachers’ experiences with the curriculum. Participants. Participants are teachers implementing the new curriculum at two schools in the metro Atlanta area. Study Method. This paper is partly descriptive, presenting the theory underlying the newly developed curriculum as well as its various features. An organizing framework, the Teacher Accessibility, Equity, and Content (TEC) rubric from Weintrop et al. (2019) [1], is used to structure the curriculum description. Teacher perceptions were gathered via both structured interviews and short online enactment surveys. These perceptions are summarized and presented thematically, corresponding to the features of the curriculum. Findings. A newly developed introductory computer science (CS) curriculum, Student-Centered Computing (SCC), utilizes project-based learning (PBL) and culturally authentic practices (CAPs) to help promote a sense of belonging and intent to persist within computer science among all students. Teachers successfully implemented the curriculum and generally found it to be beneficial for their students, though they struggled with some of the pedagogical demands of project-based learning as well as some of the most advanced technical content associated with the music coding and app development platforms. Conclusions. This paper provides a detailed overview of a year-long introductory computer science curriculum focused on the creation of culturally relevant digital artifacts. The curriculum represents a strong effort to make CS content relevant and appealing to the full range of students by relating it to their lives and experiences. Teacher surveys and interviews revealed that both teachers and students had positive views of the course. However, teaching using inclusive PBL pedagogy and culturally authentic practices takes skill and practice by teachers, supporting the need for CS teachers to have good pedagogical training as well as a strong knowledge of computer science to create a classroom environment that promotes success for all students.


The SCC Framework and Theory of Change Model
The Culturally Authentic Practice to Advance Computational Thinking in Youth (CAPACiTY) project [4] was funded by the National Science Foundation in 2016 to develop a new curriculum for the introductory high school computer science course in the [state] Department of Education's Career, Technical and Agricultural Education program. The resulting course curriculum, now titled Student-Centered Computing (SCC), was designed to provide students with an engaging introductory computer science experience that would encourage all students to continue to pursue coursework in computer science, with a specific focus on promoting continued interest in CS among girls and underrepresented minority students. Key elements of the curriculum, described in depth later in the paper, include an inquiry-driven, collaborative, project-based learning (PBL) approach and the inclusion of culturally authentic practices (CAPs) that support students' voice, choice and sense of critical agency. These practices are grounded in the psychological literature on agency, identity development, and stereotype threat, and align with the principles of culturally responsive teaching (CRT; Gay, 2002;Ladson-Billings, 1995) [5,6] and culturally responsive computing (CRC; Scott et al., 2015) [7]. The curriculum encourages students to bring their personal interests and experiences to bear on their coursework by prompting them to choose a focal problem that is interesting and meaningful to them, team up with like-minded students, and use that topic as the driver for a yearlong project. Throughout the course, students develop rigorous computational thinking skills as they create a narrated PowerPoint presentation and a website to raise awareness of their chosen problem, digitally produce music aimed at creating emotional connections to their problem, and design an app-based game to engage users in solutions to the focal problem. Through the creation of this series of digital artifacts, students work to spread awareness and promote positive change within the context of their selected focal problem, such that students are empowered to promote social good via informing and engaging an audience with technological tools and products.
The SCC curriculum is explicitly designed to encourage the development of critical CS agency, to reduce identity threat, and to promote asset-based thinking and a sense of belonging both in the course and in the larger field of CS. The project's theory of change model, based broadly on work done by Appleton et. al. (Appleton, Christenson, & Furlong, 2009) [8] and consistent with the 2021 NASEM [2] report, is shown in Figure 1. Underlying this theory of change model is the belief that when teachers adjust their classroom practice to better attend to the cultural and social needs of under-served and under-represented students, this can help increase these students' sense of autonomy, competence, and belonging. These changes in student's view of self can, in turn, lead to increased engagement and ultimately to improved student outcomes such as increased learning of computer science skills and an increased number of students intending to take additional computer science courses.
The SCC framework, which outlines the pedagogical underpinnings of the SCC curriculum, incorporates studentcentered pedagogical strategies commonly used in PBL and research-based CAPs that are designed to nurture students' choice, voice and identity in the classroom. The research-based PBL strategies incorporated into the SCC framework, described as the -Gold Standard‖ by the Buck Institute for Education (2023) [9], have been shown to promote deep student learning by enabling student's exploration, promoting understanding of content through sustained inquiry, encouraging authentic engagement with challenging real-life problems, and promoting reflection, discussion and collaboration (Bransford, Broan, & Cocking, 1999) [10].
Of particular emphasis in the SCC theory of change model, as well as in the pedagogical approaches and the curricular activities, is the notion of critical computer science agency. This concept is linked to several theoretical  [23] conceptualization of critical science agency and tailoring it to a CS context, Gale et al., 2022 [22], offer the following definition of critical CS agency: -a collective process in which students gain CS knowledge and skills, come to identify themselves as experts in CS, and, in the process of CS identity development, see and use CS as a mechanism for change‖ (p. 274). The element of change serves to distinguish critical agency from more general conceptualizations of agency; in a critical agency perspective, individuals use their knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) to enact some positive change upon themselves and/or their surrounding environment. Critical agency entails KSAs deployed for action toward a goal of improving someone or something.
How does this concept play out within SCC? The SCC curriculum, unlike peer curricula such as Exploring Computer Science (exploringcs.org, 2023) [24], does not open with questions of technology: -What is a computer?‖, -What does a computer do?‖, -Where do you find computers in your daily life‖? Rather, SCC opens with questions of humanity: -What is a societal problem that interests you, that you care about, and that you are motivated to address?‖. The first several weeks of a SCC class consist of a highly scaffolded process of problem selection, pedagogically based on best practices of PBL, during which students identify a problem that is of personal relevance and interest to them and that is of appropriate scope to support continued student interest for the whole year. Digital tools, skills, and programs are then introduced as a means to address this problem, thus enacting positive change. Little to no instruction on digital or computational KSAs is offered outside of the context of either addressing the focal problem or within activities specifically crafted to reduce identity threat and promote CS identity. The SCC teacher support materials, combined with the summer professional development, provide teachers with pedagogical tools to help guide students to identify problems they want to address, and then to offer students the digital tools they can use to address these problems.
This approach to teaching CS, with an emphasis on critical CS agency, also aligns with the related theories of culturally responsive computing (CRC) and culturally responsive teaching (CRT). CRC is -focused on how culturally responsive pedagogical strategies could be used to make technologies and technology education accessible to diverse sociocultural groups using asset building approaches‖ (Scott et al., 2015, p. 413) [7]. CRT, the approach on which CRC largely rests, stands in contrast to deficit models, in which the attributes, backgrounds, and communities of some populations are viewed as inherently problematic. CRT instead highlights these elements as both fertile ground for learning and of utility for application in educational contexts (Scott et al., 2015) [7]. In her work with the Exploring Computer Science (ECS) curriculum in high school classrooms, Ryoo (2019) [25] reports that attending to social issues directly impacting students as well as utilizing students' voices and perspectives serve to increase interest in, and engagement with, the CS content. SCC embraces this notion of individual attributes and experiences being of deep educational value by allowing the students' own selected problems to serve as the basis and context for the entire school years' worth of projects. Justifications for employing CRT methods follow two lines of thinking: 1) social justice justification, such that this pedagogy helps students respond against the -dominant culture‖ and promotes social consciousness, and 2) academic, in that this type of teaching has been linked to improved academic performance (Scott et al., 2015) [7]. SCC seems well suited to address the following stated goal of CRC: -to diminish the separation between the worlds of culture and STEM‖ (Scott et al., 2015) [7].
In many extant culturally relevant computing curricula, experiences, and programs, the designer anticipates and creates what they believe will be a culturally relevant context for the participating students. In SCC, this role of selecting and building a culturally relevant context for CS education has been transferred from the designers to the participating students. SCC is not the only curriculum to utilize this role transfer; see Scott et al., 2015 [7]'s review of culturally responsive computing curricula, specifically, COMPUGIRLS. Rote instruction on the content and use of technology tools, programs, and skills is avoided entirely in SCC. Instead, students learn about digital tools primarily within the context of the creation of digital artifacts to promote awareness of and solutions for their selfselected societal problems. The goal of eliciting students' CS critical agency via their development of technological skills and tool use, promotion of identity as an expert in the CS arena, and creation of digital artifacts to enact positive change echoes the following treatment of what constitutes success within CRC: -CRC contends that success is how far an individual operationalizes their developing agency as a technosocial agent to further their communities through systematic methods‖ (Scott et al., 2015, p. 427) [7]. Further expounding on this notion of technosocial change agents, a concept with high overlap with the idea of CS critical agency, Ashcraft et al. (2017) [26] note that computing curricula need to take -a more culturally responsive approach that engages girls in becoming technosocial change agents; that is, individuals who can challenge dominant narratives and construct more liberating identities and social relations as they create new technologies‖ (p. 234).
Further emphasis on the need to promote culturally relevant CS education comes from the Kapor Center's Framework (Kapor Center, 2021) [27], in which they characterize culturally responsivesustaining CS pedagogy as -[ensuring] that students' interests, identities, and cultures are embraced and validated, students develop knowledge of computing content and its utility in the world, strong CS identities are developed, and students engage in larger socio-political critiques about technology's purpose, potential, and impact-(p. 5). This last phrase about sociopolitical critiques overlaps with the previously discussed CS critical agency and technosocial change agents. The Kapor Center's Framework includes six components of culturally responsive-sustaining CS pedagogy, each of which is accompanied by multiple action items. These items are intended to direct CS educators towards providing CS pedagogy optimized to engage and motivate all learners by promoting individual connection to the material and culturally relevant instruction. Action items from this framework that align well with SCC pedagogy and curricular activities include:


-Educators honor and affirm students' intersecting identities with curriculum, instructional practices, and classroom culture‖  -Educators help students explore their identities to develop CS projects that reflect their passion and interests‖  -Educators ensure curriculum is high-quality, rigorous, challenging, and aligned to state and national standards‖  -Educators incorporate students' voices and perspectives throughout the curriculum and classroom experience, engaging them as cultural experts (Kapor Center, 2021) [27]‖.
Taken together, this body of literature and theory posits that effective CS instruction must position digital tools as a mechanism for creating artifacts aimed toward enacting positive change and disrupting inaccurate narratives within the context of problems and situations that students identify with and care about.
Given its importance for diversifying the CS pipeline, it is useful to consider whether CS teachers in general perceive a need for culturally responsive curriculum materials and whether they would feel comfortable implementing these materials. Prior work on teacher attitudes and values around culturally relevant CS teaching and curricula gives some insight on this question and provides context for situating the SCC curriculum and anticipating teachers' potential reactions to it. In a 2020 survey of roughly 3,700 PreK-12 CS teachers that probed their views on the extent to which CS education does and should include topics of justice, equity, and cultural relevance, only 61% of teachers profiled believed that topics of inequity should be covered within their computer science class (Koshy et al., 2021) [28]. With respect to their current CS curriculum, roughly two out of every three of these teachers felt their existing curriculum met the needs of a diverse student body while just over half believed the curriculum was culturally relevant and matched students' interests. Findings from this same survey related to teacher identity indicate that while CS teachers are highly committed to teaching CS and feel confident about being able to help their students learn to value CS and increase their self-efficacy for CS, they feel somewhat less capable of motivating students with low CS interest and just under 60% of teachers felt prepared to utilize culturally relevant teaching practices in their CS classes (Koshy et al., 2021;Ni et al., 2023) [28,29]. Taken together, these survey responses highlight three opportunities for improving equity, justice, and cultural relevance in PK-12 CS education: 1) Help teachers see the value and relevance of these topics, such that they will feel a desire to teach using culturally relevant pedagogy; 2) Provide curricula and other instructional materials that are designed to incorporate culturally relevant pedagogy and student-centered topics; and 3) Train teachers on how to utilize culturally relevant pedagogies in their CS classrooms. The SCC curriculum, when combined with aligned teacher professional development, seeks to accomplish these goals.

Research Questions
This paper documents the development of and theoretical grounding for the SCC curriculum. We also offer reporting on teachers' experiences with implementing an early iteration of the curriculum. The research questions explored in this work are as follows:


What is the nature of teachers' experiences with the implementation of a culturally relevant computing curriculum? What benefits and challenges do they encounter during their implementations?  What do teachers perceive as the impacts on their students as a result of this curriculum?

The Student-Centered Computing Curriculum
The SCC curriculum is comprised of four units that span the course as one year-long project. The first semester includes two units covering media literacy and web design, and the second semester consists of two units that introduce students to programming and application building. The SCC curriculum was designed to meet both the curriculum standards developed by the Georgia Department of Education for the Introduction to Digital Technology (IDT) course and the standards developed by the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) for K-12 education. What follows is a brief synopsis of the course, highlighting these standards. Representative examples of activities are then included in more depth in the curriculum analysis using Weintrop et. al.'s TEC rubric [1].


In Unit 1, students are introduced to the course and asked to think about a problem that is meaningful to them personally, socially, or culturally. Students then work in pairs to research this problem, and to develop a narrated PowerPoint presentation intended to inform an audience about this issue. Creation of this digital artifact relies heavily on students' background research on their problem, as well as their utilization of Microsoft PowerPoint software, including the recording and narration features. Skills and content covered: Media analysis, word processing, slideshow presentations, problem decomposition, search and information retrieval, data gathering and synthesis.  In Unit 2, students merge into groups of four or five and develop a website to raise awareness about their focal issue and to motivate website users to engage and work to address this problem in some way. Skills and content covered: Learning design process, empathy and perspective-taking, developing problems as stories and using media as narrative, web design, HTML and CSS, video integration, basic networking, data security, privacy, digital footprints, and cybercrime.  In Unit 3, students explore algorithms and other computer programming concepts within the digital music creation platform EarSketch [30]. EarSketch is a free, web-based platform that allows users to create new musical compositions by mixing musical stems using Python or JavaScript programming languages. Students use this program to create two pieces of music to accompany, and increase engagement with, their previously created PowerPoint presentation and website. Skills and content covered: Understanding data types, variables, function parameters, flowcharts, looping, debugging, copyright, music composition and storytelling, adding music to a website.  In Unit 4, students explore game design, as well as additional computer programming content, culminating their project by using an app design platform to design an app-based game. The game is intended to further increase awareness about their focal problem by modeling a potential solution. Skills and content covered: Collaborative software development, game design, booleans and conditionals, design for code reuse, representing real-life issues in gaming, and event-centered programming.

Project Implementation and School Setting
The development and implementation of the SCC curriculum and its accompanying research activities were guided by the design-based implementation research (DBIR) framework (Penuel et al., 2011) [31]. This framework hinges on a collaborative approach between researchers and practitioners and entails the -development and testing of innovations that foster alignment and coordination of supports for improving what takes place in classrooms‖ professional development sessions as well as attended weekly calls with teachers to discuss their implementations and troubleshoot problems. Teachers also provided frequent, detailed feedback on various aspects of their implementations via weekly curriculum enactment surveys. This implementation data from teachers provided valuable information to inform subsequent iterations of the curriculum. These activities align with the emphasis on -iterative, collaborative design‖ and -systematic inquiry‖ inherent in the DBIR approach. An example of this is that in Year 1 of the curriculum implementation, teachers reported that Unit 1, which covers problem selection and the creation of a narrated PowerPoint presentation, was too long and included too many iterations on the digital artifact. Teachers noted that students became bored during this unit and were eager to proceed to other digital tools, especially given their prior knowledge of PowerPoint. As a result of this feedback, Unit 1 was shortened considerably. School administrators, teachers, students, and school district level personnel were all directly involved in curriculum development, implementation, and/or research activities, satisfying the DBIR element of conceptualizing and investigating problems from the perspectives of all stakeholders. Lastly, the DBIR component pertaining to sustainability of interventions and systemic changes was addressed by expanding professional development on the SCC curriculum as well as continuing research activities among larger groups of teachers from a wider range of school districts. The DBIR framework represents a current best practice in educational research focused on largescale interventions, and the tenets of this framework are well-represented in this project.

Methods
For the research aspect of the overarching project for which the SCC curriculum was developed, a mixedmethods approach using a convergent parallel design (Cresswell & Plano Cark, 2011) [32] was taken. Teacher data were collected via online enactment surveys and periodic interviews. The variety of methods and data sources allowed researchers to collect both more general data about teachers' experiences with the curriculum (through qualitative data), as well as to elicit participants' completion of the curriculum at a high level of granularity (through quantitative data). Teacher enactment surveys consist of a yes/no checklist for specific activities within a given section, plus open-ended items on modifications made and challenges. Teacher interviews were conducted by researchers who utilized a semi-structured interview protocol. Open-ended enactment survey items as well as transcribed teacher interviews were analyzed by a single coder using hypothesis coding methodology. -Hypothesis coding is the application of a researcher-generated, predetermined list of codes…The codes are developed from a theory/prediction about what will be found in the data (Saldana, 2013) [33]. In this case, codes were derived from the TEC rubric and teacher feedback was categorized into discussion of a success or a challenge with respect to the TEC rubric element. Each data source and its accompanying methods are summarized in Table 2 below.

RESULTS
In this section, we will describe and present results for the SCC curricular components organized by TEC content dimension. The TEC rubric, specifically developed as a lens through which to view CS curricula, serves as a useful organizational and analytical framework when analyzing the different components of the SCC curriculum and the

The TEC Content Dimension
The TEC Rubric's Content Dimension contains five subcategories-1) Computing Content; 2) Instructional Design: Pedagogical Practices; 3) Instructional Design: Content; 4) Theme; and 5) Assessment. The Computing Content strand addresses whether the content aligns with standards, exhibits an appropriate learning progression, and uses appropriate disciplinary terminology. The two categories of Instructional Design together include concepts such as whether the curriculum considers students' prior knowledge, promotes higher order thinking, includes open-ended prompts, encourages students to collaborate and reflect on their learning, utilizes a mix of instructional strategies, and provides students with the opportunity to share their work and receive peer feedback. Please see Table 3 for a summary of the Computing Content and Instructional Design subcategories. The Theme strand pertains to whether non-computing contexts used for framing create a coherent and accurate storyline, and the Assessment strand addresses whether formative and summative assessments are included, along with relevant rubrics. The following analysis, summarized below in Table 5, presents the dimension of computing content and the two dimensions of instructional design as they are operationalized within the SCC curriculum, along with teachers' perspectives on the benefits and challenges they encountered during implementation for curricular components where relevant teacher feedback was present in the data. Because of the structure of the SCC curriculum, in which students choose their own focal topic for their year-long project, the -Theme‖ dimension is discussed in the section of the paper addressing the challenges presented by allowing and enabling student choice of focal topic. And given this paper's focus on teacher experiences with the curriculum itself, the development and initial implementation of SCC-aligned assessment instruments are not presented here. For information on the assessments developed within this project, please see Newton, Alemdar, Rutstein, Edwards, Helms, Hernandez, & Usselman, 2021 [34]. Content within the lesson is presented following a trajectory that begins with less complex topics and gradually increases in complexity with time Uses appropriate disciplinary terminology and promotes students' use of disciplinary terminology

Instructional Design -Pedagogical Practices
Lesson is based on clear, measurable objectives (lesson goals) that are provided to the teacher Each activity includes time for students to apply the skills that are being taught Includes a mixture of instructional strategies (e.g. discussions, modeling, student activities, worksheets, projects, etc.) Provides opportunities for students to collaborate Instructional expectations are easy to understand and directions are easy for students to use Students are provided with the opportunity to share their work with classmates and receive peer feedback

Instructional Design -Content
Considers students' prior knowledge to incorporate this knowledge into the lesson and/or cover material not previously covered Questions promote higher order (apply, analyze, evaluate) thinking Scaffolded to promote greater student understanding and independence as the learner progressed (e.g. gradually fades supports as student advances, utilized the Use-Modify-Create sequence, etc.) Lesson provides opportunities for students to explore and provide solutions to open-ended prompts Content is appropriate to the grade band and complexity students can handle ACM Trans. Comput. Educ.

Content Dimension
Provides opportunities for students to reflect on their learning

Computing Content.
The SCC curriculum focuses on the following computing concepts and practices, aligned to the K-12 CSTA Computer Science Standards: 1) Design; 2) Problem/Product Decomposition; 3) Pattern Recognition; 4) Algorithms; 5) Programming and Debugging; 6) Abstraction; 7) Networks and the Internet; and 8) Impacts of Computing. How each concept is operationalized within the curriculum is described below.


Design: In each unit students create their own -Design Vision‖ which focuses on defining their audience for their digital product, identifying the goal that the product is meant to achieve and the resources necessary to achieve that goal, and specifying why their product is relevant to that audience. In the process, students grapple with issues of stereotypes, the implications of how problems are represented, and who gets included/excluded when audiences and products are being considered.  Problem/Product Decomposition: Students move from their Design Vision to creating a storyboard, and then to translating their story or narrative into code. Each step requires that students break the problem or product into smaller subproblems that they can tackle individually. In addition, each step requires a different set of skills (research, visual representation, storytelling, coding) which provides students with multiple ways of thinking and representing their problems.  Pattern Recognition: The curriculum explicitly addresses pattern recognition in various forms. For example, during Unit 3, students identify musical patterns during unplugged activities, and then translate these musical patterns into repetitious code patterns to create their musical compositions using the EarSketch platform (Magerko et al., 2016) [30].  Algorithms, Programming and Debugging: Using the browser-based EarSketch platform, students learn to code in Python or JavaScript using a multi-track digital audio workstation. In Unit 3, as students compose unique music, they manipulate loops, compose beats, remix sounds, apply effects, and debug their products. Later during Unit 4, as they create games, they learn about conditionals and logical operators.  Abstraction: In Unit 4, students are charged with designing a game related to their previously selected problem that engages the user, highlights important aspect(s) from their previously made website, and represents their problem without potential bias or deficit perspectives. Students engage in procedural abstractions as they analyze existing block code snippets from games they have previously explored and modify them to satisfy their own game's design vision, user interactions, and data requirements.  Networks and the Internet: Students investigate the nature of the internet and networks as they post their webpages. They -take a look under the hood" of the computer system and computing networks, examining how their inputs become a web page on Google's server, and how their web page on Google's server becomes displayed onto their client computer. They later explore wireless networks, evaluate computer systems and LAN topologies, and networking trends and issues.  Impacts of Computing: Students in SCC explore the impacts of computing as they research how search engines select and present information, how different engines have the power to influence the culture around them, and the differences between reliable and speculative information on the web. They also explore the impact of computer games by experiencing and reflecting on a civics game where the game player campaigns for a community issue, learns how to organize a movement around the issue, and engages community and elected leaders to raise awareness and support for the issue.

Teachers' Perspectives on Computing Content:
Teachers' general reactions to the curriculum content were positive. They valued the selection of programs and platforms that were included and noted that the progression from PowerPoint to websites to EarSketch to creating mobile apps worked well, stating that -the strengths that I feel stand out the most to me are the use of the four main pieces of technology…the kids really, they held an interest in those topics. And also, I like the way that they"re ordered too.‖ Teachers also noted that the focus on students' creation of four artifacts gave them the opportunity to create something of value in which they could take pride, -especially when they make their game and they"ve got this website that they can be really proud of, that people could really look at and understand where they"re coming from." In terms of specific content, our focal teacher who was implementing the curriculum for the first time struggled somewhat with the more advanced coding components of the app development software. With the exception of issues of low engagement during class discussions and some of the more advanced coding concepts, teachers reported high levels of student engagement among most students, with -for the most part, 85, 90 percent of the kids, they"re doing what they need to do.‖ This was especially true for hands-on activities and coding in EarSketch, because -they like coding, right, and the idea of making their own game, making their own music, so I think they were definitely more engaged.‖

Instructional Design.
To promote equity, engagement and deep learning, the SCC curriculum uses pedagogical practices drawn from the fields of Project-Based Learning, Culturally Relevant Education, Self-Determination Theory, Asset Based Pedagogy, and Stereotype Threat contained within what the SCC instructional designers have clustered under the name Culturally Authentic Practices (CAPs). The PBL practices that are emphasized in SCC include: 1) Collaboration; 2) A Focal Problem or Question; 3) Personal and Professional Authenticity; 4) Student Voice and Choice; 5) Sustained Inquiry; 6) Critique and Revision; 7) Reflection; 8) Public Product; and 9) Communication. The Culturally Authentic Practices (CAPs) that will be the focus of this analysis of instructional design include 1) Promoting empathy and complex perspective taking; and 2) Promoting critical perspectives with regards to equity. These two practices are also important themes within the Design Thinking literature. How each of the instructional design practices is operationalized within the curriculum is described below, along with research results pertaining to implementation successes and challenges drawn from teacher surveys and interviews when such relevant research results are present in our dataset.

Collaboration
Students work in groups throughout the SCC curriculum, first in pairs during Unit 1, and later combining into larger groups as they plan and build out their websites. During the programming units, students also engage in pair programming.

Teachers' Perspectives on Collaboration and Groupwork:
Successes: In the interviews, teachers identified numerous successes and advantages associated with the collaborative nature of the SCC curriculum. Teachers felt that students generally worked well within their groups, and in cases where the groups were not well-functioning, students took advantage of some of the pivot points between projects and restructured the groups. Teacher-level benefits of the collaborative approach include that students -do learn from each other and there is less of them asking me the same question over and over and over again.‖ Teachers also noted high levels of student engagement while sharing work with peers, stating that -The kids loved listening to each other"s music," as well as observing strong alignment between the curriculum and the school's general focus on collaboration. Teachers also noted that students were able to develop their teamwork skills and that the groupwork experience mirrors the collaborative nature of many professional computer scientist tasks and activities -because, in computer science, you"re typically working with people on a big project".
Challenges: Challenges related to group work primarily involved issues of timing, division of labor, and logistics. Groups of students faced difficulties when one or more group members missed considerable class time, and some students had trouble communicating with each other about how to get started or where the group had left off in a prior class. Sometimes the contributions of group members did not fit together cohesively, and some teams did not succeed in distributing the work tasks evenly among members; as one teacher noted, -It"s hard when one of the people doesn"t pull their weight". One teacher noted that students needed more time for deep learning on teamwork skills, communication, and holding one another accountable, pointing out that -They are not used to this type of collaboration. I think it will get better over time with practice and demonstrations" and "just really about holding each other accountable…communicating and working as a group and a team, and I think they still need more help with that." ACM Trans. Comput. Educ.

A Focal Problem or Question, Personal Authenticity, Student Voice & Choice
Central to SCC's design is students' choice of the focal problem or theme that will guide their work through the whole year. Students spend several weeks at the beginning of the course identifying multiple problems that they find personally authentic and interesting, and engaging in team exercises to help them narrow their choice to a problem with enough depth to engage them for the whole year. Unit 1 is deliberately structured to help students eliminate the more superficial problems and to allow them to select the top 8-10 problems so they can continue working on them for the remainder of the year, without curtailing students' personal motivations and interest.
Teachers' Perspectives on Focal Problem, Personal Authenticity, and Student Voice & Choice: Successes: Teachers emphasized the uniqueness, centrality, and value of the curriculum's enactment of student choice. This aspect of the curriculum allowed students to select and work on topics of personal relevance to them, and to create work products in which they took a great deal of pride. One teacher emphasized this element of student choice in her overall perception of the course, remarking that -"They get to choose the problem, then they get to choose the website that they"re going to work on. They choose the ones that are going forward. So, I think student choice is really important". This personal choice component broadened the relevance of the coursework to a larger set of students and got students motivated and excited about the project, with one teacher observing -I think they found it interesting that they could choose their own topic. All students who were present were very engaged in picking their favorite topic." In discussing the wide range and variety of student topics, one teacher provided the following list of topics that students in her class had selected: -stress, sleep loss, anxiety, bullying, obesity, immigration laws, and school shootings to name a few." Table 4A provides a comprehensive list of website themes chosen by students in classes implementing Unit 1 with fidelity. Challenges: One of our focal teachers struggled with guiding students in selecting a problem. To make the problem selection process more manageable, this teacher bounded the set of possible problems to be focused solely on school-related issues, as shown in Table 4B. This was done in part because this teacher anticipated problems with students from varied socioeconomic groups finding a common problem; limiting the students to school-related topics was an attempt both to streamline the selection process and help students find common ground. Unfortunately, this bounding resulted in some students working on topics that did not sustain their interest for the full school year and projects being quite -narrow‖, as described by this teacher: While a full comparison between the two teachers is beyond the scope of this paper, it should be noted that this issue with overly constraining students' problem theme selection was experienced by the teacher implementing SCC for the first time. This self-reflection and acknowledgement of her mistake is indicative of growth in understanding the curriculum, its aims, and the pedagogical basis for the structured activities, including how to effectively facilitate problem selection. The difference in the scope and variety of topics in Table 4A as compared to Table 4B highlights the critical nature of the teacher's role in facilitating students' topic choice, such that the teacher's decisions can effectively -make or break‖ this process. This critical problem selection element of the SCC curriculum represents the -Theme‖ TEC rubric dimension. The -Theme‖ TEC rubric dimension inquires whether the framing context for the delivery of CS content is effective. In the case of SCC, the students are the ones creating this framing context, but teachers control the level of students' freedom to select a meaningful topic and thus largely determine the extent to which the context-setting that lies at the heart of the SCC curriculum is successfully enacted.

Professional Authenticity
Throughout the SCC curriculum students take on different professional roles, they practice presenting to peers, they develop a portfolio of their computer science skills, and they create a professional resume. Many of the activities designed to counter stereotype threat encourage students to envision themselves in the role of a professional computer scientist.

2.1.2.4
Sustained Inquiry: Most of the students' work in the year-long SCC curriculum revolves around their focal problem. They pose questions, find online resources, conduct interviews with stakeholders, analyze previous solutions, and create digital artifacts. Throughout the course they develop Need-to-Know lists that help inform their sustained work.

Teachers' Perspectives on Sustained Inquiry:
Successes: Teacher reflections on benefits of the sustained inquiry approach of the curriculum were infrequent in the enactment surveys and teacher interviews. One teacher observed that students felt more comfortable with an assignment upon seeing it repeatedly in each unit, observing that -Many commented that "we've done this before" and I think it helped them to feel more comfortable with knowing exactly what to do." Challenges: Teachers experienced a variety of challenges related to the curriculum's use of a sustained inquiry arc spanning the full school year, most of these being logistical rather than pedagogical in nature. Our focal teachers discussed interruptions to the normal functioning of their course: -kids are out for end-of-course testing. Then…they"re out for AP testing. So, it"s just a constant in and out." Students were pulled out of class for testing, and in one case the whole class was relocated out of their normal classroom because their classroom equipped with a ACM Trans. Comput. Educ. full class set of computers was needed for testing purposes. Both of these instances occurred in this course because it is an elective course and is less prioritized as compared to core math, English, science, and social studies courses. Individual student absences for testing, behavior issues, or other reasons created disruptions in group work that were often exacerbated by students' poor communication about their status and progress. Students got behind and were unable to contribute to the group's progress in cases where they had missed instructional content during their absence. These absence-related issues are always disruptive to teaching, but the extent of the disruptions is heightened in a course that is highly dependent on groupwork and involves a sustained inquiry approach.

Critique, Revision, Reflection, and Class Discussions:
Students regularly review each other's work, providing feedback that their classmates use to iteratively modify their digital products and artifacts. They also actively and routinely reflect on the process and their learning gains as they develop their personal portfolio and resume. The SCC curriculum also regularly directs the teacher to engage the students in group and class discussions.
Teachers' Perspectives on Critique, Revision, Reflection, and Class Discussion Successes: Teachers felt that peer review and giving feedback to peers was a valuable component of the curriculum. Teachers indicated that most students took the peer review and feedback process seriously and attempted to give useful comments, observing that "…where they give each other feedback, like the four-box feedback that was really valuable and they really took it seriously,‖ and that -Students were highly engaged with providing quality feedback to their classmates. They got right to work and were engaged with listening to other's musical elements and technical elements.‖ Despite this general feeling that students did a good job giving each other feedback, some students did not value or put much effort into this activity, as they -slept or surfed the internet. It is a struggle for kids to care about someone else"s work. They don"t get the importance of peer review". One teacher provided a general, positive comment about the quality of class discussions, but the majority of feedback about class discussion falls into the challenges section.
Challenges: Both teachers noted low engagement during class discussions, particularly those intended to be lengthy and involved discussions. Teachers described students losing interest in these discussions and/or becoming distracted with their phones or computer games, noting that "most high school students of this age can"t handle more than a few minutes of discussion", and "Kids like "to do", not sit and talk". Teachers generally indicated that students prefer and are more willing to do structured assignments with clear deliverables and are less inclined to actively participated in class discussions, giving feedback such as -it seems like students are not very engaged unless they have something to turn in, or a list of instructions/requirements to complete". This observation that students were largely unwilling to engage in lengthy, rich class discussions was a frequent topic throughout the teacher interviews.

2.1.2.6
Public Product, Communication: Each unit culminates with a showcase in which students share their products publicly to an appropriate and authentic audience. For websites, this may include people outside of the classroom, whereas for their musical and game creations the audience may be classmates. In each case students practice their communication skills, as well as their skills giving and accepting feedback.
Teachers' Perspectives on Public Product, Communication:

Successes:
A key element of the SCC curriculum is the creation of four digital artifacts that can, to varying degrees depending on the specific artifact and the school's sharing restrictions, be shared outside the classroom and/or made publicly available. One teacher discussed taking her students to a state level educational conference to share their work, noting that -they got to showcase the work that we"ve done. So, they had an opportunity to be leaders and to show something that they"re doing in the classroom that"s kind of cool." This teacher also had students in her first year of implementation who expanded on their focal problem of food insecurity and opened a food pantry to serve students within their school.
Challenges: Teachers noted limitations around having students share their work outside of the school due to school technology-related restrictions; this presented an impediment to the benefits associated with students being able to share their artifacts publicly.

Promoting Empathy and Complex Perspective Taking:
As students create their design visions, and particularly when they analyze the audience for their products, they engage in scaffolded activities that promote empathy and that require that students consider the perspectives of others with regards to their focal problem, its impact, and the products they create. Empathy is also stressed as students learn to provide constructive feedback to peers.

Promoting Critical Perspectives with Regards to Equity:
As students create their design visions, their websites, and their games, teachers are prompted to engage the class in critical discussion surrounding CS issues. Some might include an exploration of students' assumptions, and audience considerations-i.e. who is included as part of the audience, and who is excluded or forgotten. Images that are included on websites and in games also provide avenues for discussions about how people are represented and misrepresented, the ramifications of stereotypes, and how images on social media and search engines influence and manipulate audiences.
Teachers' Perspectives on Promoting Critical Perspectives with Regards to Equity Teachers observed a high level of student engagement during their implementation of these activities, such that -students were alert and engaged in completing the design vision‖, particularly on repeat encounters with the design vision worksheet across units. As noted above, students also were generally highly engaged in providing peer feedback.

The TEC Equity Dimension
The TEC Rubric's Equity Dimension contains three subcategories-Culture (community-level), Identity (individual-level) and Exceptionalities (ELL, Special Ed., etc.). Concepts in the community-level Culture category include that the curriculum reflects diverse cultural heritages, enables students to share their own culture, and connects learning to students' home life. Examples of individual-level Identity concepts are that the curriculum is meaningful and authentic for students, enables students to see themselves represented in the materials, and gives them the opportunity to share their life experiences and represent themselves in their projects. The Exceptionalities category assesses whether the curriculum includes multiple representations within a lesson to accommodate diverse and exceptional learners and provides extensions to deepen the learning experience for more advanced students. Please see Table 6 for a summary of the Culture, Identity, and Exceptionalities subcategories of the Equity Dimension.

Culture (Community-level)
Reflects and highlights the diverse cultures, perspectives, languages, and community values of students with regards to cultural heritage and/or contemporary youth culture (e.g., popular video games or common student interests/activities) Gives students the opportunity to share their own culture and cultural heritage Connects learning to students' homes, neighborhoods, and communities

Identity (Individual-level) Context is meaningful and authentic to students and connects to students' interests
Provides opportunities for students to contribute their knowledge and perspectives about a lesson's topic and share information about their life experiences Students see themselves represented in the curriculum and classroom materials Provides opportunities for students to represent themselves in their projects

Exceptionalities (ELL, Special Ed, etc.)
Provides multiple representations within the lesson by adapting for a variety of different types of learners using alternatives to reading, writing, listening, and speaking such as translations, pictures, or graphic organizers Provides extensions that allow a deeper understanding of topics for students who meet the performance expectations Assessment methods are accessible to all students and do not penalize or reward students due to exceptionalities Most of the activities and themes embedded in the SCC curriculum that were designed to promote culturally authentic practices (CAPs) align with the dimensions of culture and identity. The two CAPs that explicitly target issues of culture are 1) Promoting asset-based thinking and sense of belonging and 2) Building equity through collaborative work. The two CAPs that promote individual identity are 1) Building Critical Agency and 2) Addressing social identity/stereotype threat. In addition, the SCC curriculum also provides support for diverse learners and extensions for advances ones, which corresponds to the exceptionality dimension. The following analysis, summarized in Table 7, presents the manner in which each CAP is infused into the curriculum, along with relevant teacher feedback corresponding to the given CAP when such research results are present in our dataset.

Promoting asset-based thinking and sense of belonging.
The SCC curriculum emphasizes the skills, knowledge, perspectives and strengths present already in students, their groups and communities. As part of the curriculum, students select problems relevant to their personal, social or cultural experiences and work to make sense of these problems from both the research and storytelling perspectives. This emphasis on storytelling, as opposed to having an emphasis on -facts‖, enables students to incorporate their own personal stories and culture into their digital products. The use of EarSketch to engage musically and communicate to audiences also capitalizes on students' creativity, multiple skills, and out-of-school funds of knowledge and engagement with musical forms. Students also build a resume over the course of the year, sequentially adding new skills to the resume and reflecting on the strengths, or assets, that they bring to the project. By the end of the course, students have explored multiple different types of roles involved in computer sciencebased careers and reflected upon their own interests and talents.
Teachers' Perspectives on Promoting Asset-Based Thinking and Sense of Belonging The emphasis in the SCC curriculum on enabling students to use their lived experiences as a foundation for problem selection and subsequent artifact creation aligns with asset-based thinking. The assets student bring with them in terms of their own experiences and values are utilized and highlighted within the course. Students valued this aspect of the problem selection process, with a teacher noting that -students were particularly engaged in the brainstorming discussion about the problems they face."

Building equity through collaborative work.
Skillfully facilitating groupwork to support and engage all students requires care and practice by teachers. The SCC curriculum is designed to provide a context for collaborative learning experiences that increase equity in the classroom. Students in SCC continually work in groups and have the opportunity to try on multiple roles related to different CS skills. Some of these roles, such as Server Administrator, Layout Designer, Project Manager, and Quality Assurance Manager, are defined within the curriculum and rotated among the students. In addition, the curriculum offers continuous opportunities for students to engage in collaborative work-like pair-programming, and teacher-facilitated peer-feedback. Teachers are provided with support materials on how to effectively use jigsaw collaborative learning activities, which are strategies designed to provide equitable group work experiences for students. The curriculum also provides the teacher with support suggestions on how to manage group dynamics, cultural considerations that may emerge during the process, and how to maximize students' voice and choice. As mentioned above, teachers sometimes struggled with how to effectively manage collaborative learning over an extended project and commented that collaboration and group work is a learned skill that students need time to master.

Building Critical Agency.
The SCC curriculum focuses on building critical student agency in multiple ways. The curriculum is designed so that students can develop a sense that they can, through their actions, effect some change in others or impact a situation. The year-long PBL arc allows students to educate audiences and promote advocacy efforts around a specific issue using their CS skills. Creating digital products and solutions related to the problem they care about provides an opportunity to use computer science skills to address real-world needs and problems, helping them change the world into one that they view as more just. For a more in-depth discussion of student agency within the context of the SCC curriculum, please see Gale et al., 2022 [22].

Teachers' Perspectives on Building Critical Agency
In providing a general description of her view of the SCC course and its instructional strategies, one teacher emphasized the solution-oriented nature of the artifacts students create in addition to the emphasis on student choice of focal problems, stating that "…so the kids vote on which PowerPoints they think are the most important, that they could see being made into a website, and then even coming up with an app to kind of solve the problem. So, we kind of talk about the end game there…and then they work on a website where really diving into, what is the problem and how do we solve it, and what solutions are there." As Newton et al., 2021 [34] discuss, real world logistics and constraints can put an upper limit on the extent of critical agency students are actually able to achieve, as in the case of students who worked on the issue of water quality in their school but were ultimately unable to present their work to the school administration as they had wished to do. This issue of developing versus realizing critical agency in K-12 projects of this nature is one that warrants further consideration.

Addressing social identity/stereotype threat.
There are several interventions threaded through the SCC curriculum that explicitly address issues of stereotype threat. Reframing ability as malleable and incremental has been shown to increase students' achievement and reduce instances of stereotype threat (Aronson, Fried & Good, 2002 [35]; Yeager and Walton, 2011 [36]). Students' incremental views of their CS skill acquisition and knowledge growth are strengthened in the curriculum by having them explore different roles in computer science as they create their products and document their increasing skills through reflection in their resume and portfolio. After seamless engagement in programming activities, students participate in discussions about -Who is a Coder?‖, which enables them to recognize the activities they just completed as intrinsically related to -being a coder.‖ This allows students to envision themselves in that role, therefore creating an opportunity for self-affirmation within the computer science domain, and for students to visualize possible paths and encourage congruity between the self and the CS identity (Oyserman, Bybee, & Terry, 2006 [37]; Oyserman et al. 2015 [38]). In addition, the curriculum provides video interviews with Black and Latinx students who are current computer science majors at a higher education institution. In these videos, these college students discuss the challenges they have faced, and how they were able to overcome them, which provides relatable role model examples to students in the course (Dasgupta, 2011 [39]) and the possibility of reframing academic difficulties (Walton & Cohen, 2007 [40]). The focus on exploring computer science careers and the skills students have and would need to gain also allows them to envision a -future self‖ in computer science.
Teachers' Perspectives on Addressing Social Identity/Stereotype Threat Teacher comments suggest generally high levels of student engagement during implementation of these activities, which was a surprise to one teacher: -they"ve been really engaged with the resume…that was a real surprise to me…they were way more engaged that I thought they would be for that." Similarly, high levels of student engagement were seen with the portfolio organizer, such that -students were engaged in completing the portfolio organizer. They seemed excited to close out the curriculum with this final activity and were engaged as they completed each of the questions." However, some students struggled with the resume and -didn"t seem to understand what exactly they could add to the resume.‖ The computer science student interview videos stimulated reflective discussions with at least some students, with one teacher noting that -We had some good conversations. I think they got some insight to what it"s like at [school name] and that perhaps they can achieve the same result." Student engagement in learning about and thoughtfully exploring different roles within computer science was variable, with one teacher observing that students -now have a better understanding of the requirements for each role so they talked together to decide the new roles‖ and another teacher noting that -they didn"t" seem to read about the roles, but instead just jotted their names down in the binder for the new roles. It was very rushed". One teacher provided a compelling sentiment that suggested the curriculum is helping students feel more comfortable with the computer science content area as a whole, suggesting that -I feel like the impact may be that they aren"t as intimidated by computer science. That term could seem a little bit intimidating, so I think that that could be impactful for the students." ACM Trans. Comput. Educ. ACM Trans. Comput. Educ.

Exceptionalities.
Differentiated instruction in SCC is enabled by the PBL nature of the curriculum and the strength of student's engagement in self-selected problems. Students who have mastered the basic technical material can extend their work, creating more extensive websites to better promote their problem and solution, composing more complicated music that includes higher level coding skills, and creating new procedures for their games. Different types of learners are supported through collaborative learning strategies that promote equity, and through experiences such as pair-programming.

The TEC Teacher Accessibility Dimension
The TEC Teacher Accessibility dimension includes the level of teacher support included in the curriculum, such as whether there is a full lesson plan, whether the materials are educative for teachers with varying levels of skills, and whether it includes student worksheets, assessments, and examples of student misconceptions. Please see Table 8 for a summary of the Teacher Support and Supplemental Materials subcategories of the Accessibility Dimension. Teachers appreciated the overall structure and flow of the curriculum, describing it as being smooth and having continuity across the school year, in that -it"s really laid out well…one lesson follows another, and it"s kind of a smooth transition, which is helpful for the kids.‖ One teacher discussed becoming significantly more comfortable upon teaching the lesson for a 2 nd time and then subsequent times across her class periods, as compared to her first time teaching the lesson, noting that -I teach a lesson one day, then I teach the same section the next day to a different group of kids, and it"s just amazing how much my comfort level increased for that second round.‖ Specific challenges pertained to needing more scaffolding for some of the coding content in EarSketch and the app development software, as well as struggles with long sections of content delivery.

DISCUSSION
Analysis of the SCC curriculum using the TEC rubric shows that the curriculum aligns well with the dimensions of importance proposed by Weintrop et. al. [1] and by the NASEM [2] report. There is a heavy emphasis on promoting equity, engagement, and developing a sense of belonging and identity as well as introducing students to the computer science disciplinary content put forth in the CSTA standards. Building students' critical computer science agency is also a key focus of the curriculum. The critical question about any new curriculum, however, is whether teachers can implement the materials in regular classrooms within the existing system of schools, and what skills teachers must have to successfully accomplish the implementation. Our experience with SCC suggests that there are definite challenges to implementing CS curricula that utilize the pedagogical strategies and extended inquiry typical of project-based learning. These challenges are multifaceted and rooted in the teaching experience and pedagogical skills of the teacher, as well as other contextual factors such as the degree to which schools prioritize non-CS core classes over CS electives, and the level of transience and absenteeism among the students.
As with every other disciplinary content, the pedagogical skills of the CS teacher are of paramount importance if the goal is to engage a diverse set of students and attract them into the field. However, with school systems everywhere under increasing pressure to offer CS and computational thinking instruction starting as early as elementary school, the demand has greatly outpaced the supply of CS teachers equipped to provide this type of inclusive instruction. Due to this shortage of CS teachers, school systems routinely recruit CS teachers from industry, often bypassing formal teacher training programs. Twice as many high school CS teachers lack a teaching credential as compared to high school math and science teachers (16% vs. 7%), and only 25% of high school CS teachers have degrees in CS-related fields or CS education (Banilower et al., 2018) [3]. Our work, consistent with the work of others attempting to implement reform-based curricula in computer science classrooms (Goode et al., 2014 [41]; Goode et al., 2021 [42], Ryoo, 2019 [25]), emphasizes that for teachers to be able to effectively engage all types of students in CS content and help diversify student pathways into CS, they need pedagogical training that emphasizes inclusive and student-centered instruction, not just a firm grasp of technical CS skills. This is particularly critical at the introductory level, where students often make career decisions based on their perceptions as to whether they belong or not in a field. Our view is that good reform-based teaching that emphasizes diverse students' motivational and multi-cultural needs is paramount in supporting learning and expanding all students' access to careers in computer science. If students in the 9 th grade can't imagine themselves as computer scientists or see how CS skills are relevant to their interests and lives, they are unlikely to enroll in advanced CS classes later in high school. The Student-Centered Computing curriculum, scaffolded to support inclusive and culturally authentic practices, is a new addition to available curricula that strive to promote just this type of expansion of students' perceptions of their possible identities and futures.
Unsurprisingly, we observed a learning curve with the SCC curriculum, emphasized in the comparison between the two focal teachers, one of whom was implementing SCC for the first time and one of whom was implementing SCC for the second time. For our veteran teacher, she noted that she was more comfortable with the software, -especially the second time teaching it. Then, next year I"m just going to be even that much better.‖ Similarly, our new teacher saw improvements in her comfort level with the curriculum even between her first and second time teaching a given lesson, as stated in the Teacher Accessibility dimension discussion. As noted earlier, the problem selection issue encountered by our new teacher was not seen with our veteran teacher. In addition to prior experience with this specific curriculum, years of experience with teaching computer science likely plays a major role in teachers' comfort level with SCC and the extent to which this comfort level increases with subsequent implementations.
Unfortunately, even highly talented teachers struggle when their classes are not prioritized by the school and when students are frequently pulled from class or are absent from school. Even though it is a crucial course for attracting under-represented students into CS, because the IDT course is an elective, it is generally the first one that students are pulled out from during testing periods and assemblies, or when they are needed for other school functions. It is also a course that students are assigned to if they just need a class to fill a schedule hole, even if it is half-way through the school year. Excessive student absenteeism was identified by the teachers as a definite challenge to effective group work and to their ability to sustain a year-long PBL project.
In this paper, we describe a curriculum that strives to make introductory computer science relevant to, and captivating for, the full range of students through its use of project-based learning and culturally relevant pedagogy embedded within the context of a problem that is of personal relevance to students. We also demonstrate where and why teachers both succeed and struggle with their implementation of this curriculum. Data collected from teachers illustrates that they value many aspects of the curriculum and experienced a set of relatively consistent challenges during their implementations. As is nearly always the case in the teaching profession, successful implementation of this curriculum requires that teachers are skilled in both the content and the pedagogy the curriculum requires. Pedagogical challenges with such curriculum components as implementing class discussions, managing groupwork, and facilitating the problem selection process were generally more prominent than issues with mastering the technical content, which were largely limited to the more advanced features within EarSketch and the app development platform. The TEC rubric served as a valuable tool for breaking down our description of the curriculum and relevant teacher feedback into discrete curricular components so that the unique contribution of, and successes and challenges within, curriculum implementation with our focal teachers could be analyzed.