Rock paper symbols: Leveraging the spiral curriculum to teach coding in primary schools

Brendan Jacobs; Solina Quinton; Rania Al-Hammoud

Download Paper | Permalink

Conference: 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Publication Date: June 22, 2025
Start Date: June 22, 2025
End Date: August 15, 2025
Conference Session: Computing and Information Technology Division (CIT) Technical Session 9
Tagged Division: Computing and Information Technology Division (CIT)
Page Count: 13
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--57148
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/57148
Download Count: 14

Paper Authors

biography

Brendan Jacobs The University of New England orcid.org/0000-0002-1848-9356

visit author page

Brendan Jacobs is an Associate Professor and Head of Department (STEM Education) at the University of New England, Australia. His research interests are in STEM education, explanatory animation creation, conceptual consolidation and digital scholarship.

visit author page

biography

Solina Quinton University of Waterloo

visit author page

Solina Quinton is an environmental engineering graduate from the University of Waterloo with a passion for education. Her experience in the field of engineering education began during her time in Australia working on The SILO Project, an integrative STEM education resource for primary students. Solina has continued this work to focus on the Ontario curriculum, and her goal is to continue to connect with and further inspire students’ interest in STEM learning.

visit author page

biography

Rania Al-Hammoud University of Waterloo

visit author page

Rania Al-Hammoud is an associate professor teaching stream and the current associate chair of undergraduate studies at the civil & environmental engineering department at university of waterloo. Dr. Al-Hammoud has a civil engineering background with research focusing on materials and the rehabilitation of reinforced concrete structures. She also has passion for engineering education and has published widely in this area. She cares about the success and well-being of her students, thus always being creative with the teaching methods in the classroom. She also won multiple teaching awards.

visit author page

Download Paper | Permalink

Abstract

As coding becomes more prevalent, it is often seen as “hard and boring” [1], discouraging students from pursuing it [2]. This poses a problem as the future requires more coders than are currently entering the industry [3]. Further emphasis on the importance of teaching coding to students can be seen through its benefit to young children’s development of soft skills such as creativity, communication, and various thinking skills [4]. This raises the question of how to engage children in coding from an early age. A hands-on approach in classrooms can spark curiosity and engagement in learners [5].

This paper reports on a STEM integration project based around the co-creation of 28 integrated units of work, one for each term over the seven primary years. Coding is part of the robotics theme which begins in Year 1 with a focus on ‘Symbols’ before moving into ‘Coding’ in Year 3, ‘Sensors’ in Year 4, and ‘Electronics’ and ‘Robotics’ in Year 6. Bruner’s spiral curriculum [6] is utilised throughout the project as concepts are introduced and then reintroduced with increasingly complexity. Students are first exposed to coding in kindergarten when they use micro:bits to generate random numbers for use in tallies and tables. In Year 1, students explore Morse code and learn to program micro:bits to light up with a dot or a dash depending on the button pressed. Students then apply and extend their existing knowledge of math symbols into coding through a game where students are each given two cards; one containing a random number, and one containing a symbol (<, >, =). While students stand in a circle facing each other, deciding which symbol card to display based on the chosen number cards becomes a diagnostic tool to demonstrate whether students can use symbols as an application of conditional statements.

Using pseudocode, flowcharts, and conditional statements, students also learn to represent rules for the game rock paper scissors. Students who participated in the activities showed increased levels of enjoyment and understanding of the concepts being taught, affirming the link between engagement and learning [2]. This hands-on approach can be applied to teach coding fundamentals while keeping students engaged, potentially growing interest in coding and STEM fields for the future.

Citation
Format

Jacobs, B., & Quinton, S., & Al-Hammoud, R. (2025, June), Rock paper symbols: Leveraging the spiral curriculum to teach coding in primary schools Paper presented at 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition , Montreal, Quebec, Canada . 10.18260/1-2--57148

TY - CPAPER
AB - As coding becomes more prevalent, it is often seen as “hard and boring” [1], discouraging students from pursuing it [2]. This poses a problem as the future requires more coders than are currently entering the industry [3]. Further emphasis on the importance of teaching coding to students can be seen through its benefit to young children’s development of soft skills such as creativity, communication, and various thinking skills [4]. This raises the question of how to engage children in coding from an early age. A hands-on approach in classrooms can spark curiosity and engagement in learners [5].

This paper reports on a STEM integration project based around the co-creation of 28 integrated units of work, one for each term over the seven primary years. Coding is part of the robotics theme which begins in Year 1 with a focus on ‘Symbols’ before moving into ‘Coding’ in Year 3, ‘Sensors’ in Year 4, and ‘Electronics’ and ‘Robotics’ in Year 6. Bruner’s spiral curriculum [6] is utilised throughout the project as concepts are introduced and then reintroduced with increasingly complexity. Students are first exposed to coding in kindergarten when they use micro:bits to generate random numbers for use in tallies and tables. In Year 1, students explore Morse code and learn to program micro:bits to light up with a dot or a dash depending on the button pressed. Students then apply and extend their existing knowledge of math symbols into coding through a game where students are each given two cards; one containing a random number, and one containing a symbol (&amp;lt;, &amp;gt;, =). While students stand in a circle facing each other, deciding which symbol card to display based on the chosen number cards becomes a diagnostic tool to demonstrate whether students can use symbols as an application of conditional statements.

Using pseudocode, flowcharts, and conditional statements, students also learn to represent rules for the game rock paper scissors. Students who participated in the activities showed increased levels of enjoyment and understanding of the concepts being taught, affirming the link between engagement and learning [2]. This hands-on approach can be applied to teach coding fundamentals while keeping students engaged, potentially growing interest in coding and STEM fields for the future.

AU - Brendan Jacobs
AU - Solina Quinton
AU - Rania Al-Hammoud
CY - Montreal, Quebec, Canada
DA - 2025/06/22
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Rock paper symbols: Leveraging the spiral curriculum to teach coding in primary schools
UR - https://peer.asee.org/57148
DO - 10.18260/1-2--57148
ER -