Logo experiences with young children: Describing performance, problem‐solving and social contexts of learning

Abstract

The present study represented the final in a series of five which explored the performance of children in Logo tasks while they worked in one of three gender pairs (girl, boy or boy/girl). Differences in performance based on the gender of the pair had been apparent in the early studies when specific types of tasks were presented as initial experiences in the new domain. This was found to be so whether the robot or screen turtle was the medium. The present study analysed the performance and strategies of 30 pairs of children (mean age 7 years 3 months) in relation to three sets of tasks. The children worked with the screen version of Logo (LCSI) in tasks that required them to make accurate copies of given (logo) figures and to direct the turtle up a path to a destination. The results revealed that when the copy task was presented first and followed by the track task there were no significant differences in performance in terms of accuracy or efficiency of moves made in order to reach the end of the path. This was a contrast to previous findings when the track task had been presented first. The current research illustrated that performance was moderated by the type of strategies that were deployed and the nature of the collaboration of the pairs.