Abstract:

The present project, Technology and Programming Learning Laboratory for Preschool and Primary School (https://www.nonio.uminho.pt/kml2), contemplates the creation of a physical space in the University of Minho, for programming and robotics learning by future Education professionals, pre-graduate and post-graduate students at this institution, as well as education professionals seeking lifelong learning.

This project also includes a mobile laboratory destined for the Higher Education Institutions that support the project: ESESetúbal, ESEViseu, ESELisboa, ESEBragança and Universidade Nova de Lisboa. There is also the possibility of extension to other higher education institutions that show interest in joining. Thusly, we seek to distribute resources at the national level to implement programming and robotics activities and for these Institutions to be consultants in the development of a national framework, with the goals of studying and reformulating the programs of curricular units of the technologies in the Education courses.

This project encompasses the distribution of mobile laboratories across the country's institutions explicitly allowing for the reduction of the inequalities that exist between the interior and the coast. This may also enable these institutions, which already carry out these activities autonomously, to collaborate in the joint construction of a framework that may contribute to the formative needs of all. The Kits to be distributed to the higher education institutions contribute to the laboratories of each institution, optimizing existing resources, and thus offering the possibility of pregraduate and postgraduate students to experiment with programming and robotics.

To monetize expenses and to take advantage of the knowledge and resources developed in schools, we will have the support of the Mira Schools Group, through the Club of Technology and Innovation - Informatics and Robotics, and its students of the professional courses, for the development of some robots to be used during this project.

Guided by a methodological approach of action-research, with a perspective of social analysis of a real problem within the educational context, we will study the formative needs of the educators of preschool and primary school, regarding the technologies, programming, and robotics, to later build a theoretical framework. We have the partnership of the UÉvora to survey the training needs in a national level. The construction of the referential is carried out by UMinho, together with the associated consultants (in the respective institutes) and also with consultants in the NEE area. We also count on the partnership of UAberta to build a prototype of MOOC for the training of trainers. We will also have the close consulting of two invited scientists: Professor Marina Bers (Tufts University - USA) for her knowledge in programming and robotics in preschool and Claudia Urrea (Massachusetts Institute of Technology - USA) programming and robotics specialist at primary school.

Keywords:

Computational thinking, Learning Programming and Robotics, Teacher Training, Technologies in Education.