International Journal of Social Robotics
CALL FOR PAPERS
SPECIAL ISSUE ON
Improving computational thinking with Robots and Controlling Things
Submission Deadline: September 1, 2016
Guest Editors
- Francisco José García-Peñalvo, Associate Professor of the Computer Science Department, Research Institute for Educational Sciences, University of Salamanca, Spain
- Ilkka Jormanainen, School of Computing, University of Eastern Finland, Finland
Motivation
It has recently been in the news that EEUU president Barack Obama called upon the nation to make computer science "a basic skill, right along with the three 'Rs'". This is not new and not more important because of Obama’s opinion, it is a real need for future generations of workers that should know, at least, the basic laws of a computer-based society and, without demerit to humanities or social sciences, trying to reduce the current gap with STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) careers.
Several countries have usually adopted several priorities for developing ICT competences from kindergarten to secondary education. Most of them are focused on the development of key competences and/or coding skills. Although coding may be very attractive for young students and a very good practice or experience, it could be more interesting to develop students’ logical thinking skills and problem-solving skills throughout programming approaches or computational thinking.
In TACCLE3: Coding European Project (http://www.taccle3.eu/) , researchers have stated that one of the best options to apply an active learning approach throughout problem based learning method is to develop programs that can control robots or things in general building up kits with actuators and controls that should solve specific problems within the classroom context.
This special issue is devoted to identify, share and valorise best practices and experiences (including technological and methodological issues) that focused on the development of computational thinking and related skills using robots or physical devices controllers in any level of pre-university education.
Topics
For this Special Issue, we solicit original and unpublished contributions related to the latest advances in computational thinking development with robots. The special issue aims at gathering high-quality manuscripts where practical activities will be detailed. Well-proven and supported teaching resources that introduce the robot at the classroom linked to a computational thinking skills development will be preferable. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
- Robots and computational thinking
- Controlling things
- Experiences with new teaching materials
- Laboratory experiments in educational robotics
- Design of educational projects with robotics
- Pilot studies in educational robotics
- Robotics in school
- Development of Curriculum in robotics at the pre-university education
- Free and printable Robots
- Competitions as motivation activities
Important Deadlines
- Submission of manuscripts: September 1, 2016
- Notification of reviewers’ feedback: November 15, 2016
- Submission of final manuscripts: December 15, 2016
- Final acceptance: February 15, 2017
- Publication: April 1, 2017
Submission
We also would like to encourage submissions of interdisciplinary work by authors from different areas. If authors have any questions regarding the suitability of their work for this special issue, whether topical or methodological, they should not hesitate to contact the lead guest editor (fgarcia [at] usal.es.).
Full submissions must be sent through the online submission system https://www.editorialmanager.com/soro/default.aspx
General information and guidelines are available at the Journal web site: http://www.springer.com/engineering/robotics/journal/12369/PSE.
Contact addresses
Francisco José García-Peñalvo, Associate Professor of the Computer Science Department, Research Institute for Educational Sciences, University of Salamanca, Spain, fgarcia [at] usal.es
Ilkka Jormanainen, School of Computing, University of Eastern Finland, Finland, ilkka.jormanainen [at] uef.fi