This thesis examines how computer programming and mathematics teaching converge in the presence of a revised mathematics curriculum for upper secondary education. The focus is on the stratified policy strategies deployed by the institutions; how teachers tactically navigated the tensions and contradictions that arose in their everyday teaching; and how these tactics later consolidated in practice.

The empirical data for the study consists of two iterations of individual interviews with nine mathematics teachers who were already proficient inprogramming at the onset of the reform. The teachers’ unit plans and other programming activities, were used as starting points for in-depth discussions about their professional practices. To gain a comprehensive understanding of the context, the author also examined relevant policy documents, including the mathematics curriculum, official guidelines, and a collection of programming exercises and demonstrations provided by the Agency for Education.

Along with these documents, the official strategies were also informed by the explicit decisions and implicit outcomes surrounding the National Exams. By analyzing teachers’ tactics and policy strategies, the thesis sheds light on the ways in which teachers adapted to the new curriculum and the challenges lenges they faced in integrating programming into their mathematics instruction.

This research aims to contribute to a critical understanding of the complex relationship between curriculum reforms, teacher practices, and the integration of programming in mathematics education. When mathematics teachers started integrating computer programming into their subject, two tactical approaches became evident: dual teaching and interspersed programming. The teacher’s proclivity to implement dual teaching practices or interspersed programming are tactics shaped by and in response to the conditions of the new curriculum and their own preferences and views on student learning. These two tactics disclose different ontological commitments in relation to the strategies dictated by the curriculum and reflect a cardinal distinction between planning mathematics activities with elements of programming and planning programming activities with elements of mathematics. Of relevance for teachers and curriculum designers is the understanding of (a)how the notion of programming and mathematics as separate subjects oversimplifies teachers’ actual integration practices, and (b) how the curricular choices made by policy can shape the teaching tactics adopted by educators.

Gradually, both the surrounding constraints and the reasons behind them evolved, rising new practices. The second iteration of interviews was designed to unveil the consequences of latter curricular constraints and delve into the teachers’ practices as they change over time. Teachers’ initial resolutions, trials and experiments with programming in mathematics are sometimes reinforced by means of perseverance and the teachers’ mature reflectionson their past experiences. Other tactics need to be refined or updated and yet some are discarded. Along this distinction, relevant categories emerged that illustrate the processes behind consolidated practices in the presence of new technologies. Furthermore, the thesis provides a discussion on how this transition is characterized by acceptance of new practices rather than acceptance of new technologies.

Recognizing these aspects can guide educators and curriculum designers towards a better understanding of the complexities and nuances involved in integrating programming into mathematics education. This understanding can inform more effective teaching practices and curriculum development that support meaningful integration and promote students’ learning in mathematics with the help of programming.

Denna avhandling undersöker hur programmering och matematikundervisning förenas i närvaro av en reviderad kursplan för matematik på gymnasiet. Fokus ligger på strategier som myndigheterna införde, hur lärare taktiskt navigerade de spänningar och motsägelser som uppstod i deras undervisning, och hur dessa taktiker senare konsoliderades i praktiken.

Två taktiska tillvägagångssätt blev tydliga när lärare började integrera programmering i matematik: Dual undervisning och sammanvävd programmering. Lärarens användning av duala undervisningsmetoder eller sammanvävd programmering var olika taktiker som formades av och som respons på villkoren i den nya läroplanen samt deras egna preferenser och syn på studenternas lärande. Dessa två taktiker avslöjar olika ontologiska åtaganden i förhållande till de strategier som representeras i styrdokumenten.

Successivt utvecklades de omgivande villkoren och gav upphov till ny undervisningspraxis. En andra omgång av intervjuer avslöjade hur senare reformer och nya insikter förändrade lärarnas praxis över tid. Lärarnas ursprungliga beslut både bekräftas och finslipas med nya erfarenheter och reflektioner. Andra taktiker behöver uppdateras, medan vissa kasseras. Processen mot en etablerad matematikundervisning med programmering ilustreras i relevanta kategorier där det framträder hur förändringen sker via bejakandet av programmering som praxis snarare än teknologi.

The discourses that we create around our present will shape our future. This is particularly true in education where today's students are being equipped to handle and forge the society of tomorrow. One widespread trend sweeping school curricula all over the world is the idea that children and young adults should learn the fundamentals of programming. Increasing efforts are being devoted to this endeavour reaching schools with varying results. Along with these changes in policies and practices, the field of programming education has received growing attention from other stakeholders, not least researchers. The visions and assumptions of those who study and develop this phenomenon are likely to impact its outcome. The purpose of the review is therefore to explore the perceived significance of programming in future society, through the lenses of how researchers frame its introduction in schools. The study was carried out as a literature review surveying open-source journal papers that reported on initiatives related to programming in education in the last five years. The material was collected in a three-step process, including database search, screening, and selection. The search rendered 1089 potentially relevant research papers. Further screening shortened the list to 26 articles featuring 91 individual researchers from 15 different countries. The selected papers were analysed with content analysis to identify codes pertinent to research question, which were later grouped in categories for presentation in this study.

Results show that mainly positive outcomes are anticipated as a consequence of introducing programming in education. The benefits include filling the needs of a future labour market and preparing students for active participation in an increasingly digitalised society. There were also papers emphasising how learning programming could bring improvements in problem-solving and analytical thinking but also provide space for self-expression and creativeness. Programming in education was believed to enhance social interactions and teamwork skills and to boost motivation and intersectional engagement. However, more critical notions regarding the introduction of programming in education were largely absent, which should be addressed in future research. While programming was seen as a way to raise awareness of the risks associated with a digital society, few authors broadened the discussion to include other less beneficial aspects of programming literacy. Researchers' perceptions in the context of programming in education are compared to previous research on 21st century skills. The findings provide a deeper understanding of the expectations that guide contemporary research and should be of interest not only to the research community but also to teachers and policymakers, in an attempt to spark a discussion that will yield more nuanced implementation of this and future educational initiatives.

The technology acceptance model (TAM) that guided many behavioristic investigations during the last three decades has been gradually expanded and even replaced by subsequent explanation models that attempt to predict the uptake of digital technologies in organizations. In the era of postdigital education, where the distinction between digital and non-digital becomes inessential to the design and implementation of learning activities (Fawns 2019), we face the challenge of explaining, predicting, and promoting new school practices that go beyond technology. To this endeavor, a Practice Acceptance Model was outlined as a next step to capture the nature of acceptance in relation to technologies, in which the artifacts themselves were not the object of acceptance or rejection, but rather the practices that a technology class brought about (Fuentes-Martinez 2020). In this paper, we delve further into the ideas of a Practice Acceptance Model in the context of interspersing mathematics and computer programming in education. The discussion takes up the preceding ideas that rebrand computer programming as a practice rather than a technology, along with other pedagogical practices of mathematics teachers. Therefore, the parameters that traditionally characterize TAM evaluations are here reframed to better reflect the nuances of teachers’ everyday practices. The present longitudinal study serves to postulate new variables that mediate between the advantages and disadvantages expected when teaching mathematics with elements of programming and the prevalence of this practice in subsequent teaching ventures. Two external variables stand out from these data. First, the teacher’s perceived programming readiness among their students seems to be a decisive factor in whether or not to include coding activities. Also, the perceived frequency of programming opportunities in the national exams appears to have a decisive impact on a conjoint practice. While these two factors resemble the “perceive Ease of Use” and “perceived Usefulness” from TAM, the data suggest that teachers’ internal beliefs on how to practice their discipline play an important role and should be included in a Practice Acceptance Model. Those variables include how teachers regard the intrinsic connection between programming and mathematics, as well as their understanding of which mathematical knowledge is most valuable.

On 17 March 2020, Postdigital Science and Education launched a call for testimonies about teaching and learning during very frst Covid-19 lockdowns. The resulting article, ‘Teaching in the Age of Covid-19’ (attached), presents 81 written testimonies and 80 workspace photographs submitted by 84 authors from 19 countries. On 17 March 2021, Postdigital Science and Education launched a call for a sequel article of testimonies about teaching and learning during very first Covid-19 lockdowns. The resulting article, ‘Teaching in the Age of Covid-19—1 Year Later’(attached), consists of 74 textual testimonies and 76 workspace photographs submitted by 77 authors from 20 countries.These two articles have been downloaded almost 100,000 times and have been cited more than 100 times. This shows their value as historical documents. Recent analyses, such as ‘Teaching in the Age of Covid-19—A Longitudinal Study ’(attached), also indicate their strong potential for educational research. As the Covid-19 pandemic seems to wind down, pandemic experiences have entered the mainstream. They shape all educational research of today and arguably do not require special treatment. Yet, our unique series of pandemic testimonies provides a unique opportunity to longitudinally trace what happens to the same people over the years—and this opportunity should not be missed.

Today, we launch a call for fnal sequel: Teaching in the Age of Covid-19—The New Normal. In this sequel, we would like to hear about ways in which you—contributors to the previous articles—have established your own new normal. We hope that this will be the last iteration in this series of testimony articles. Unless the world faces another strong pandemic outburst, we would like to end the series with this last article.

As computer programming is widely being introduced in school curricula around the world, many teacher training initiatives are being put into practice to address the competence needs linked to that endeavor. The imperative digitalization catalyzed by governments’ response to the Covid-19 emergency brought about  an  unexpected plot twist largely  affecting  most  professional development  efforts.  After  rapidly reprioritizing resources toward urgent matters of online teaching, some teachers also embraced the new opportunities that distance courses offered for their own education. Findings from these experiences are here synthesized to examine how teacher training in computer programming could be improved to better suit the affordances and constraints of online courses. The principal themes, problems, approaches, and solutions that emerged from this small-scale  qualitative  study are contrasted with the prevalent  ideasidentified in the literature, such that in adult learning experiences, blended and hybrid learning settings, and computer programming education. Among the common characteristics with these earlier paradigms, issues of idle time, asynchronousity, and unreliable tools were highlighted but also similar advantages regarding autonomy and equity. A particular factor that distinguished the  case of online programming training for educators was the gap between the learning that teachers themselves experienced during the programming course and the learning facilitation that they were expected to provide for their pupils in a school environment. This gap was not only related to the different  visions and purposes for their education but also, and to a larger extent, due to different contexts, including assessment traditions and subject  separation.  This work provides  hindsight  towards  an understanding  of  the  significance  and nature of learning programming for teaching and the challenges and benefits associated with adapting to online settings.

Teachers’ everyday practices are embedded in school contexts in which their teaching autonomy is constrained by rules, moral obligations, physical settings,and official directives. When a curricular revision mandated that programming was to be a part of mathematics in upper secondary education, teachers’ conditions changed. How teachers adapted to the new curriculum and how they navigated the tensions and contradictions that they encountered is in this thesis analyzed in terms of teachers’ tactics and policy strategies. The overall goal of the investigation is to contribute to a critical understanding of how mathematics teachers integrate programming in their professional practice and how this integration aligns and diverges from the intentions behind the reform. The empirical material is drawn from nine individual interviews with mathematics teachers that were already proficient in programming. The teachers’ unit plans and other lesson materials featuring programming activities served as a trigger point to delve into further reflections upon their own professional practices. To complete the scene, the policy documents were also examined. These included the mathematics curriculum, as well as related official documents and a collection of institutionally sanctioned programming exercises and demonstrations.

Two tactical approaches were made apparent when mathematics teachers began to integrate computer programming in their subject: Dual teaching and Interspersed programming. The teacher’s use of dual teaching practices or interspersed programming are tactics shaped by and in response to the conditions of the new curriculum and their own preferences and views on student learning. These two tactics disclose different ontological commitments in relation to the strategies dictated by the curriculum and reflect a cardinal distinction between planning mathematics activities with elements of programming and planning programming activities with elements of mathematics. Of relevance for teachers and curriculum designers is the understanding of (a) how the notion of programming and mathematics as separate subjects oversimplifies teachers’ actual integration practices, and (b) how the curricular choices made by policy can shape the teaching tactics adopted by educators.