Student-Identified Themes Around Computation in High School Physics

We are developing a survey which evaluates the attitudes of students exposed to computational learning activities in their high school physics classrooms. We administered a pilot questionnaire in various classrooms and conducted a thematic analysis on student responses. Several themes were identified for investigation via teacher interviews while further themes emerged from analysis of open-ended responses to initial survey items. Those themes included the applicability of physics ideas in coding, computational thinking practices, and the usefulness of computation. This work lays the foundation for the development of a robust and validated survey that assesses students’ opinions, expectations, and attitudes towards learning computation in their science classes.