Entering the Clubhouse

Yasmin B. Kafai, Deborah Ann Fields, William Q. Burke · Journal of Organizational and End User Computing · 2010

Previous efforts in end-user development have focused on facilitating the mechanics of learning programming, leaving aside social and cultural factors equally important in getting youth engaged in programming. As part of a 4-month long ethnographic study, we followed two 12-year-old participants as they learned the programming software Scratch and its associated file-sharing site, scratch.mit.edu, in an after-school club and class. In our discussion, we focus on the role that agency, membership, and status played in their joining and participating in local and online communities of programmers.

Read the paper · More papers on PaperTik