Upper Elementary and Middle Grade Teachers' Perceptions, Concerns, and Goals for Integrating CS into Classrooms

As efforts to integrate computer science into K-8 teaching in the US are dramatically rising, professional development workshops for teachers are becoming widespread. An open challenge for the CS education community is to understand teachers' needs and develop empirically grounded best practices for professional development. This experience report describes a five-day professional development workshop in which 22 third through eighth grade teachers learned about fundamental CS concepts, practiced coding, and created lesson plans for integrating what they learned into their classroom. We describe the professional development workshop including its modules and sequencing, and present teachers' perception of CS and how to integrate it into their classrooms. Teachers achieved significant gains in technical knowledge and improvements in attitude toward computer science. In initial focus groups, teachers reported that limited exposure to CS, time constraints, and lack of understanding of CS are barriers to integrating it into their classrooms. After the workshop, focus group feedback indicated that the workshop provided teachers a clearer sense of the potential of CS to enhance their classroom plans. Teachers noted that they felt able to use CS to help students learn critical thinking, prepare them for their futures, and address their individual needs. The results of this experience can inform future workshops that address the needs of teachers and students.