News

We are delighted to announce that Greg Michaelson this week joined the Centre for Research in Digital Education as an Honorary Professor.

Greg is a proponent of strong Computational Thinking, as a principled discipline for systematic problem analysis and program construction. He has recently published critiques of classic Computational Thinking as too computation oriented, and of the Logo/Microworld and Objects First approaches. He is a regular contributor to ‘Hello World!’, the magazine of Computing at School and the Raspberry Pi Foundation.

Every learner should have the opportunity to learn about computing science, not only about how to code but also about information handling with computers, and data citizenship - how their personal data is used, their legal rights and privacy implications.  

Women in Data

Celebrating women working in data and challenging industry to promote and retain women are core priorities for the Data Driven Innovation 'Women in Data' project.  Professor Judy Robertson, Chair in Digital Learning, has taken part in the project as one of 50 women interviewed about their work in the tech sector. 

'Effie St John' (the robot) joins the Centre for Research in Digital Education

This week the Centre welcomed our new ‘robot colleague’ (mentioned in our teaching Manisfesto) Effie St John is a telepresence robot, which we are trialling over the next few months on behalf of the Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI - hence the name!).

Copyright Lesley Martin

The Data Education in Schools project held three 'Data Town' events in May / June which brought together young people from across the City Region (Edinburgh, East Lothian, Midlothian, West Lothian, Fife and Borders), to consider what a 'Data Town' of the future might look like. 

Research stay reflections

by US-UK Fulbright visiting scholar, Shana Ferguson

“Fake news!” a student at Leith Academy shouts as we examine an example of pro-Brexit propaganda in a Digital Literacy class. It would appear that the label “fake news” is as overused in the UK as it is in the US.