My view of the profession has changed — CS Unplugged
Educational project of the Hi-Tech Park for preschool institutions

My view of the profession has changed


Christina Stiblo, Preschool Teacher of the Nursery School-Kindergarten №46 of Orsha (Belarus)

When I started working in the public educational institution "Nursery-kindergarten No. 46 in Orsha", I found out that my colleague is the head of the “Computer science unplugged” club. She invited the pupils of my group to study in this club. After classes, the children enthusiastically shared their positive impressions. I also attended several classes with the pupils. The way the children’s eyes burned, with what interest they carried out the proposed tasks – it captivated me.

Studying the elements of computer science, the child learns to plan, to build the logic of specific events, ideas, he develops the ability to predict the result of actions. He starts thinking before he acts.

At the seminar in the Hi-Tech Park, I got acquainted with the methodological recommendations for organizing classes within the framework of the “Computer science unplugged” program for preschool institutions, saw the entire learning process, and even took part in it myself as a student. During the seminar, I realized what an interesting and creative activity I was facing, and I plunged into work with pleasure.

With this project “Computer science unplugged”, my professional approaches have changed a little. In my usual regular activities, I began to introduce didactic games and exercises that I used in the club, for example, "Resourceful driver", "True-false", "Find the way home", "No, not true", "In reality", "Correct the error with NOT", etc. Children happily accept these additions in educational activities. I did this to make it easier for the child to assimilate the proposed material both in the classroom and during the visit to the club.

Thanks to this method of presenting information, children quickly develop the ability to orient themselves in space, train the effectiveness of attention and memory, develop fine motor skills, form the finest coordination of eye movements, reduce the time of both simple reactions and reactions of choice, develop purposefulness and concentration, develop imagination and creativity, elements of visual-figurative and theoretical thinking.

Studying the elements of computer science, a child learns to plan, to build the logic of specific events, ideas, he develops the ability to predict the result of actions. He starts thinking before he acts. The basics of theoretical thinking are being mastered, such mental operations as generalization, classification of objects according to characteristics are being formed, and this is very important in preparing a child for school.

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After I began to lead a course “Computer science unplugged”, my view of the profession has changed significantly. Previously, I believed that the work of a preschool teacher was limited to group activities, writing plans and notes, interacting with parents. However, I soon realized that this is not all. After all, when working with children, you don't want to be limited to just one program, but you want something new. When I started leading a course, I automatically received the title of tutor. In a preschool institution, a tutor not only helps in the educational process, he makes this process focused on the child's personality, his capabilities. The tutor also actively cooperates with the parents of the pupils.

During the project, the parents had many questions. The most difficult one for me was to explain to dads and moms how we can teach children the basics of programming without using a computer.

I didn’t want to burden the parents with theory and concepts related to informatics, but for the best perception I decided to go directly to practice, inviting adults to also become members of the “Computer science unplugged”course and independently complete the tasks that their children will do.

Parents "tested" on themselves all the techniques and methods, all the games and exercises which were held by me. Hearing such simple tasks as "The Right Way", "Who Will Ride the Train?", "Correct the mistake with NOT", the adults decided that the games and exercises would be easy to complete. However, starting the assignment, they almost immediately faced difficulties: they weren’t able to give the correct answer to the question immediately, they needed time to think. They became even more interested, they also consulted with each other, worked together. After the lesson, the parents were delighted. Now their first question when they meet me is: “How are you doing in the course? How can we help? " They are not just consumers of services, they are my first assistants.

At the end of my story, I would like to note that with my arrival in the world of programming, my teaching activity, so as my life, definitely won’t stay the same.

Previously, I have always associated the concept of "computer science" with a computer, but now I realized that you can teach children to program without it. I began to realize the importance of programming: programming opens up many new learning opportunities for children.

Programming is the second literacy.