Designing Digital Learning Tools to Foster Preschoolers’ Understanding of Data Science Concepts

Abstract

This design case presents the development of a digital tool to foster young children’s data science learning in preschool classrooms. Recognizing the growing importance of data literacy, our cross-disciplinary team sought to integrate the affordances of digital, mobile, touchscreen technology, and best practices in digital app development with developmentally appropriate approaches to data science. As part of this effort, we designed the Preschool Data Toolbox, a tablet app that, with teacher support, allows children to complete data investigations by providing meaningful, kid-friendly questions they can answer with data. The app was designed to be used by teachers while also being developmentally appropriate for preschool children to both view and use directly. It supports the collection, organization, visualization, and analysis of data to help children answer questions, complete investigations, and create their own data stories to share findings. We share the development of the Preschool Data Toolbox as a design case that documents our attempt to create a demonstration project: a data science digital tool usable for young, preliterate preschool children with teacher support and adaptable to common preschool classroom practices. The goal of this design case is to document the design decisions and the team’s approach to developing a tool that is developmentally appropriate, instructionally meaningful, and technically feasible for teachers and children to use together in preschool classrooms. The case does not claim proof of effectiveness; rather, it examines the design goals we set, the constraints we encountered, and the extent to which the final product reflects those intentions.