PROCEEDINGS OF THE 21ST ANNUAL CONFERENCE ON RESEARCH IN UNDERGRADUATE MATHEMATICS EDUCATION
2018
San Diego, California
Computational Thinking in Mathematics: Undergraduate Student Perspectives
Page: 1597
Computational thinking (CT) is understood as the thinking, strategies, and approaches for solving complex problems with algorithmic considerations and in ways that can be executed by a computer. This survey study (n=104) reports on the conceptions of undergraduate mathematics majors and future mathematics teachers enrolled in a sequence of programming-based mathematics courses. Results suggest that students’ emerging conceptions of CT became relatively well-aligned with expert views and that their characterization of CT included many computational practices (e.g. from modeling and simulation) and related affordances (e.g., creativity, agency) and outcomes (e.g., benefits learning, deeper mathematics understanding)