The Beauty and Joy of Computing Curriculum and Teacher Professional Development

The Beauty and Joy of Computing (BJC) is a CS Principles course developed at UC Berkeley for high school juniors through university non-majors. Together, UC Berkeley, the Education Development Center, and NC State have brought BJC to 700+ teachers nationwide. Since 2011, NC State has developed regional partnerships and a train-the-trainer model to offer nationwide PD to 600+ high school teachers. Our guiding philosophy is to meet students where they are, but not leave them there. BJC covers the big ideas and computational thinking practices in the AP CSP curriculum framework using Snap!, an easy-to-learn blocks-based programming language, and powerful computing ideas like recursion, higher-order functions, and computability. Through BJC, students create beautiful images, and realize that code itself can be beautiful. Having fun is an explicit course goal. BJC takes a "lab-centric" approach, and most learning occurs through guided programming labs where students explore and play. In this workshop, we will provide an overview of BJC, share experiences as instructors at university and high school levels, and share details of summer PD opportunities. Laptop needed.