Improving Children's Computational Thinking Through a Combination of Unplugged and Plugged-in CT Techniques Tangible with Robot Games

Abstract

In today's digital era, introducing the concept of computational thinking ( CT ) from an early age is very important. Binekas School, as an educational partner at the Playgroup, Kindergarten (TK), and Elementary School (SD) levels, is committed to introducing CT to children starting at the age of 4. Currently, Binekas School only offers optional extracurricular coding activities at the elementary school level and uses a hard coding approach, which may be too challenging for most students. This school wants to prepare students with an introduction to the basics of coding from kindergarten using a more child-friendly approach, namely plugged-in with tangible robotics. The proposed solution includes an introduction to CT knowledge with a focus on algorithm development and CT training through tangible plugged-in techniques using robots for children aged 4 years and above. This training will not only improve children's understanding of the CT concept in an interactive and fun way, but will also prepare them for future educational challenges. The tools that will be used in this training are the Robotic Gigo Smart Brick, a robotic system designed for children so that they can learn basic programming concepts and computational thinking through interactive games. This outreach activity uses a combination of unplugged CT through card media and physical maps to train problem-solving mindsets accompanied by the opportunity to test proposed solutions with plugged-in CT using the Robotic Gigo Smart Brick. From the results of the activity evaluation through a questionnaire, it was found that 92% of students agreed that the application of the combination of unplugged CT and plugged-in CT was fun, the material was easy to understand and they were interested in getting further material.