Designing Inclusive Computational Thinking Learning Trajectories for the Youngest Learners

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is an extensive article that focuses on the development of computational thinking in early childhood. This is a very current topic. However, the content of the article is far too extensive and confusing, the reader loses connection with important information while reading and misses basic information. The content of the article is more from the field of psychology. Some passages of the article should definitely be better and clearer. Although the results of qualitative research are presented here, they are lost in the flood of text, which is often only marginally related to the content. Important information should be made visible, eg line 370 371 - program development levels. Links are often missing.

 

The article should be completely revised, in this version I do not recommend it for publication.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

Thank you for your feedback. We agree that this is a lengthy article containing a vast number of concepts. We have attempted to synthesize one part of our five year project using the learning trajectories approach, developed and tested through the Curricula Research Framework. Thus, the amount of information and therefore text is copious. We believe that the current length of the manuscript is appropriate to the topic and research aims. Further, we appreciate your attention to the organization of the manuscript and plan to update tables to clarify study observations and remove examples. Last, we plan to add newer citations to the discussion section to frame our findings and update links where applicable.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper describes a study on developing learning trajectories for progressions across the topics of computational thinking. In collaboration with teachers and developmental professionals, the study aimed to identify learning trajectories that are suitable for both typical students and students with disabilities.

The study is methodologically sound and well conducted, with well elaborated results. The same developmental progressions for teaching computational thinking are used for both typical students and students with disabilities, with suggested adaptations for children with disabilities. The resulting examples and observations provided are clearly presented and useful for practitioner teachers and early childhood professionals.

The paper could be improved in the following:

1. Line 523: The abbreviations IEP and IFSP should be explained for more clarity to the broader audience.

2. Table 3: It is not clear which examples and observations correspond to which description. It would be better to either separate them more clearly or, preferably, add horizontal lines in the table to make it clear which items belong to each row.

3. While I agree that abstraction and decomposition are difficult to implement with preschool children, I think the concepts of causation and conditionals are worth deeper exploration. For example, "If it rains, we need to take an umbrella." In the grocery shopping example, where repetition is taught, you could try incorporating a condition: "If you didn't bring your wallet, we put the items back on the shelf." Similarly, you could use a balance scale as an example: "If one bowl is heavier than the other, move an item from the heavier bowl to the lighter one." Another method could involve a simple memory game: "If the pictures do not match, close them." I suggest the authors review existing literature, much of which they have cited in section 2.2.6, and make an additional effort on developing learning trajectories based on these concepts.

4. There are only seven references (less than10%) in the last three years (2021-2023). The paper could benefit from reviewing more recent works in the field.

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2,

Thank you for your feedback. We appreciate your attention to details of clarity for a broad audience and will update the manuscript as you have suggested. Further, we agree that updating the tables to remove or separate examples from study observations will clarify the qualitative methodology. We apologize that our manuscript may have given the impression that we did not see causation and conditionals as appropriate for the age group. We will work to clarify that, rather than removing causation and conditionals due to developmental appropriateness, we synthesized our findings from the testing of this progression with the testing of cross-cutting concepts. Thus, causation and conditionals have been combined with cause and effect and the findings from that work will be presented in a separate manuscript. Last, we agree that newer citations are needed. Due to much of the cited literature being gathered to frame the early versions of our progressions, those citations reflect the beginning of this 5 year project. We plan to use the newer literature we have identified to better frame the discussion. Overall, we believe your suggestions will greatly improve the manuscript and are grateful for your review.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I take note of the authors' explanation, but a good researcher must be able to briefly, clearly and comprehensibly describe even five years of research to every reader.

Data obtained from research could be put to better use.