Creative Computing Online Workshop

Learning how to use computer code as a medium for expression, creativity, and problem-solving takes time and a supportive community. ​During the excitement about MOOCs in the early 2010s, we wondered whether we would be able to adapt our in-person, hands-on workshops with Scratch to this learning-at-scale format, creating the time and community that educators need to support their learning about creative computing in a new medium.

To investigate this possibility, we designed the Creative Computing Online Workshop (CCOW). Hosted in 2013, CCOW was a six-week learning experience designed for educators who wanted to learn more about using Scratch and supporting computational thinking in classrooms and other learning environments. The first three weeks of CCOW were an opportunity to build familiarity and fluency with Scratch, guiding participants through the fundamentals of the Scratch authoring environment and online community; the last three weeks of CCOW offered time and support for participants' independent projects, from exploring advanced features of Scratch, to designing a series of classroom lesson plans, to writing a proposal for an after-school club.

2,148 people enrolled in the initial offering of CCOW, which was conducted from June 3 until July 12, 2013. Although the synchronous elements are not available, all of the asynchronous elements of CCOW—including activities, videos, and readings—continue to be available to you online.