Computing Effect Sizes of a Science-first-then-didactics Computational Thinking Module for Preservice Elementary School Teachers

Recently, Computer Science education in Switzerland reached a critical milestone. In the past two years the School of Education of FHNW, one of Switzerland's largest schools of education, introduced a mandatory Computer Science education module, comprised of a two-course sequence for its students: pre-service primary-level schoolteachers. Due to its design and audience, this mandatory module introduces a variety of unique challenges. The module is taken by a majority of female students (75%), many with no prior experience and/or interest in programming and Computer Science. The module starts with a course focused on learning Computational Thinking, referred to as FW, followed by a course focused on teaching Computational Thinking, referred to as FD. Since 2017, 1000 pre-service primary-level teachers have been trained in Computer Science education through this module. This curricula initiative computes the effect sizes from teaching two complete iterations of the "FW then FD" design. It is based on attitude assessment data collected at four points: Pre-FW, Post-FW, Pre-FD, Post-FD, during the first two years of this mandatory module. Our research indicates that, by course's end, pre-service teachers are mostly confident in their ability to program and think computationally.