Search the California Content Standards

Standard:
Select and operate computing devices that perform a variety of tasks accurately and quickly based on user needs and preferences.

Descriptive Statement:
People use computing devices to perform a variety of tasks accurately and quickly. Computing devices interpret and follow the given instructions literally. Students select and operate an appropriate computing device and corresponding program or app for a given task. For example, students could use computing devices to describe what plants and animals (including humans) need to survive. In this case, students could choose to use a keyboard to type explanatory sentences onto graphics. They could also choose to use a touchscreen device with a stylus to annotate an image for a slideshow, or choose to use a camera enabled device to make a video. Student choices may reflect their own needs or the needs of others. (CA NGSS: K-LS1-1; 2-LS4-1) Alternatively, students could choose to use a computing device with audio recording capabilities to recount stories or poems. Students could clarify thoughts, ideas, or feelings via their preference of either using a device with digital drawing tools, or by creating paper and pencil drawing based on their needs and preferences. (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy SL.K.5, SL.1.5, SL.2.5)

Standard:
Collect and present data in various visual formats.

Descriptive Statement:
Data can be collected and presented in various visual formats. For example, students could measure temperature changes throughout a day. They could then discuss ways to display the data visually. Students could extend the activity by writing different narratives based on collected data, such as a story that begins in the morning when temperatures are low and one that begins in the afternoon when the sun is high and temperatures are higher. (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy RL.K.9, RL.1.9, RL.2.9, W.K.3, W.1.3, W.2.3). Alternatively, students collect peers' favorite flavor of ice cream and brainstorm differing ways to display the data. In groups, students can choose to display and present the data in a format of their choice. (CA CCSS for Mathematics K.MD.3, 1.MD.4, 2.MD.10)

Standard:
Work respectfully and responsibly with others when communicating electronically.

Descriptive Statement:
Electronic communication facilitates positive interactions, such as sharing ideas with many people, but the public and anonymous nature of electronic communication also allows intimidating and inappropriate behavior in the form of cyberbullying. Responsible electronic communication includes limiting access to personably identifiable information. Students learn and use appropriate behavior when communicating electronically (often called "netiquette"). For example, students could share their work on a classroom blog or in other collaborative spaces online, taking care to avoid sharing information that is inappropriate or that could personally identify themselves to others. (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy W.K.6, W.1.6, W.21.6) Alternatively, students could provide feedback to others on their work in a kind and respectful manner. They could learn how written words can be easily misinterpreted and may seem negative when the intention may be to express confusion, give ideas, or prompt further discussion. They could also learn to identify harmful behavior on collaborative spaces and intervening to find the proper authority to help. (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy W.K.5, W.1.5, W.2.5) (HSS 1.1.2)

Standard:
Describe how computing devices connect to other components to form a system.

Descriptive Statement:
Computing devices often depend on other devices or components. Students describe physical and wireless connections to other components, including both input devices (e.g., keyboards, sensors, remote controls, microphones) and output devices (e.g., 3D printers, monitors, speakers). For example, students could describe the relationship among the heart, lungs, muscles, blood, and oxygen during physical activity and then compare this to how a mouse, keyboard, printer, and desktop computer connect and interact to allow for input, processing, and output. (P.E.3.4.7) Alternatively, when describing how light reflected from objects enters the eye and is then transferred to the brain to construct a visual image, students could compare this to a computing system that uses programming to construct a visual image when data is transferred and constructed/reconstructed through a keyboard, camera, or other components. (CA NGSS: 4-PS4-2)

Standard:
Organize and present collected data visually to highlight relationships and support a claim.

Descriptive Statement:
Raw data has little meaning on its own. Data is often sorted or grouped to provide additional clarity. Organizing data can make interpreting and communicating it to others easier. Data points can be clustered by a number of commonalities. The same data could be manipulated in different ways to emphasize particular aspects or parts of the data set. For example, students could create and administer electronic surveys to their classmates. Possible topics could include favorite books, family heritage, and after school activities. Students could then create digital displays of the data they have collected such as column histogram charts showing the percent of respondents in each grade who selected a particular favorite book. Finally, students could make quantitative statements supported by the data such as which books are more appealing to specific ages of students. As an extension, students could write an opinion piece stating a claim and supporting it with evidence from the data they collected. (CA CCSS for Mathematics 3.MD.3, 4.MD.4, 5.MD.2) (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy W.3.1, W.4.1, W.5.1) Alternatively, students could represent data in tables and graphical displays to describe weather experienced in the last several years. They could select the type of graphical display based on the specific data represented (e.g., daily high/low temperatures on a scatter plot, average temperatures for a month across years in a column chart). Students could then make a claim about expected weather in future months based on the data. (CA NGSS: 3-ESS2-1)

Standard:
Seek and explain the impact of diverse perspectives for the purpose of improving computational artifacts.

Descriptive Statement:
Computing technologies enable global collaboration and sharing of ideas. Students solicit feedback from a diverse group of users and creators and explain how this input improves their computational artifacts. For example, students could seek feedback from classmates via user surveys, in order to create an idea and then make a claim as to how to improve the overall structure and function of their computational artifact. Using the feedback students could write an opinion piece supporting their claim. (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy W.3.1, W.4.1, W.5.1) Alternatively, with guidance from their teacher, students could use video conferencing tools, shared documents, or other online collaborative spaces, such as blogs, wikis, forums, or website comments, to gather and synthesize feedback from individuals and groups about programming projects. (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy SL.3.1, SL.4.1, SL.5.1)

Standard:
Design modifications to computing devices in order to improve the ways users interact with the devices.

Descriptive Statement:
Computing devices can extend the abilities of humans, but design considerations are critical to make these devices useful. Students suggest modifications to the design of computing devices and describe how these modifications would improve usabilty. For example, students could create a design for the screen layout of a smartphone that is more usable by people with vision impairments or hand tremors. They might also design how to use the device as a scanner to convert text to speech. Alternatively, students could design modifications for a student ID card reader to increase usability by planning for scanner height, need of scanner device to be connected physically to the computer, robustness of scanner housing, and choice of use of RFID or line of sight scanners. (CA NGSS: MS-ETS1-1)

Standard:
Collect data using computational tools and transform the data to make it more useful.

Descriptive Statement:
Data collection has become easier and more ubiquitous. The cleaning of data is an important transformation for ensuring consistent format, reducing noise and errors (e.g., removing irrelevant responses in a survey), and/or making it easier for computers to process. Students build on their ability to organize and present data visually to support a claim, understanding when and how to transform data so information can be more easily extracted. Students also transform data to highlight or expose relationships. For example, students could use computational tools to collect data from their peers regarding the percentage of time technology is used for school work and entertainment, and then create digital displays of their data and findings. Students could then transform the data to highlight relationships representing males and females as percentages of a whole instead of as individual counts. (CA CCSS for Mathematics 6.SP.4, 7.SP.3, 8.SP.1, 8.SP.4) Alternatively, students could collect data from online forms and surveys, from a sensor, or by scraping a web page, and then transform the data to expose relationships. They could highlight the distribution of data (e.g., words on a web page, readings from a sensor) by giving quantitative measures of center and variability. (CA CCSS for Mathematics 6.SP.5.c, 7.SP.4)

Standard:
Collaborate with many contributors when creating a computational artifact.

Descriptive Statement:
Users have diverse sets of experiences, needs, and wants. These need to be understood and integrated into the design of computational artifacts. Students use applications that enable crowdsourcing to gather services, ideas, or content from a large group of people. At this level, crowdsourcing can be done at the local level (e.g., classroom, school, or neighborhood) and/or global level (e.g., age-appropriate online communities). For example, a group of students could use electronic surveys to solicit input from their neighborhood regarding an important social or political issue. They could collaborate with a community artist to combine animations and create a digital community collage informing the public about various points of view regarding the topic. (VAPA Visual Art 8.5.2, 8.5.4)

Standard:
Describe ways in which abstractions hide the underlying implementation details of computing systems to simplify user experiences.

Descriptive Statement:
An abstraction is a representation of an idea or phenomenon that hides details irrelevant to the question at hand. Computing systems, both stand alone and embedded in products, are often integrated with other systems to simplify user experiences. For example, students could identify geolocation hardware embedded in a smartphone and describe how this simplifies the users experience since the user does not have to enter her own location on the phone. Alternatively, students might select an embedded device such as a car stereo, identify the types of data (e.g., radio station presets, volume level) and procedures (e.g., increase volume, store/recall saved station, mute) it includes, and explain how the implementation details are hidden from the user.