EcoMOD: Integrating Computational Thinking in Ecosystem Science Education via Modeling in Immersive Virtual Worlds

Integrating scientific modeling into elementary education offers the potential to meet important 21st century learning goals, including the development of deep understandings of science content and practice. Computational thinking and scientific modeling are incorporated in the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States) as essential practices for STEM education. Computational models in K-12 science education can make scientific concepts more accessible and enhance student understanding of phenomena, particularly when students are able to engage in programming scientific models.
Visual block-based programming interfaces offer new opportunities to bring computational modeling for STEM learning to younger learners. Immersive virtual environments and computational modeling platforms offer complementary ways to support student engagement and learning. EcoMOD is an NSF-funded research curriculum for 3rd grade science that interweaves an immersive 3D virtual ecosystem and a 2D visual programming and modeling environment to support learning both ecosystem science concepts and computational modeling. In this Connected Learning showcase, we describe the blended design of EcoMOD, and findings on student learning with the curriculum.