Design of an online learning environment for teachers specialized for computational thinking

The aim of this study is to design an online learning environment which has been specialized for computational thinking of teachers. An opportunity has been provided related to experiencing a process with the development of computational thinking skills in online learning environment with specialized computational thinking activities for teachers from different areas with the developed environment. Two working groups as design and testing have been studied with in this research. Design group consists of individuals from the occupational groups stated as having computational thinking in literature (n=10), testing group consists of science and technology, mathematics, social sciences and computer sciences (n=8) teachers The application of the study has been realized in 6 weeks period. In the direction of the first sub problem in the content of the study, the definition of computational thinking and components of computational thinking in the direction of this definition have been given. In the second sub-problem, the features of online learning environment which has been designed for teaching of computational thinking have been presented. In the third sub-problem, the development of environment's participant teachers' computational thinking skills has been looked over. In the fourth sub-problem, the ideas of the teachers related to their experiences they had and the environment they had developed have been examined. In the last sub-problem, the ideas of the teachers related to the quality of the developed environment have been taken into account. Findings have been reached stating that the environment in which design based research method has been used and has been developed online learning activities and has been tested with application may be functional in developing the skill of computational thinking. Also, some principles related to the teaching of computational thinking have been identified. According to the findings, computational thinking is not a set of skills developing itself. It should be developed by aimed and significant activities. It mostly requires forcing and time taking educational process for the users. As change in thinking processes of individuals does not realize in a short time, it requires learner support with long period.