{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,12]],"date-time":"2026-03-12T16:18:23Z","timestamp":1773332303585,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":44,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"9","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2021,9,8]],"date-time":"2021-09-08T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1631059200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001871","name":"Funda\u00e7\u00e3o para a Ci\u00eancia e a Tecnologia","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["UIDB\/50008\/2020"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["UIDB\/50008\/2020"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001871","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001871","name":"Funda\u00e7\u00e3o para a Ci\u00eancia e a Tecnologia","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["UIDB\/00194\/2020"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["UIDB\/00194\/2020"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001871","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001871","name":"Funda\u00e7\u00e3o para a Ci\u00eancia e a Tecnologia","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["2020.06821.BD"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["2020.06821.BD"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001871","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Education Sciences"],"abstract":"<jats:p>There is a growing presence of technology in the daily lives of elementary school students, with a recent exponential rise due to the constraints of remote teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is important to understand how the education system can contribute to helping students develop the required skills for technological careers, without neglecting its obligation to create conditions that allow them to acquire transversal skills and to enable them to exercise full citizenship. The integration of Educational Robotics and block programming activities in collaborative learning environments promotes the development of computational thinking and other ICT skills, as well as critical thinking, social skills, and problem solving. This paper presents a theoretical proposal of a didactic sequence for the introduction to educational robotics and programming with Scratch Jr. It is composed of three learning scenarios, designed for elementary school teaching. Its main goal is to create conditions that favour the development of computational thinking in a collaborative learning environment. With increasing complexity and degree of difficulty, all the tasks root from a common problem: How can we create an algorithm that programs the robot\/sprite to reach a predetermined position?<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/educsci11090518","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2021,9,8]],"date-time":"2021-09-08T02:41:07Z","timestamp":1631068867000},"page":"518","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":16,"title":["Fostering Computational Thinking Skills: A Didactic Proposal for Elementary School Grades"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"11","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1866-1283","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Ricardo","family":"Silva","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Escola de Ci\u00eancias e Tecnologia, Universidade de Tr\u00e1s-os-Montes e Alto Douro, 5000-801 Vila Real, Portugal"},{"name":"CIDTFF\u2014Centro de Investiga\u00e7\u00e3o em Did\u00e1tica e Tecnologia na Forma\u00e7\u00e3o de Formadores, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal"},{"name":"Instituto Polit\u00e9cnico de Coimbra, ESEC, NIEFI\u2014PEAPEA, 3030-329 Coimbra, Portugal"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0850-9755","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Benjamim","family":"Fonseca","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Escola de Ci\u00eancias e Tecnologia, Universidade de Tr\u00e1s-os-Montes e Alto Douro, 5000-801 Vila Real, Portugal"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-9962-562X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Cec\u00edlia","family":"Costa","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Escola de Ci\u00eancias e Tecnologia, Universidade de Tr\u00e1s-os-Montes e Alto Douro, 5000-801 Vila Real, Portugal"},{"name":"CIDTFF\u2014Centro de Investiga\u00e7\u00e3o em Did\u00e1tica e Tecnologia na Forma\u00e7\u00e3o de Formadores, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1812-2300","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Fernando","family":"Martins","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Instituto Polit\u00e9cnico de Coimbra, ESEC, NIEFI\u2014PEAPEA, 3030-329 Coimbra, Portugal"},{"name":"Instituto de Telecomunica\u00e7\u00f5es, Delega\u00e7\u00e3o da Covilh\u00e3, 6201-001 Covilh\u00e3, Portugal"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,9,8]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (2019). 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