The Sol y Agua RPP
Monika Akbar, Katherine S. Mortimer, Grecia Navarrete, Stephanie K. Galvan, George Molina, Romelia Rodríguez Reyes, Cynthia Ontiveros, Scott Gray, Sarah Escandon, Monica Lyons, Pedro Delgado, Victor Medrano, Haleigh Kneedler, Patricia Benitez, Jacob Ramirez, Jesus Vazquez, Melissa Anderson · Proceedings of the 53rd ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 2 · 2022
The Sol y Agua researcher-practitioner partnership (RPP) project introduces computational thinking (CT) in the middle school of the Paso del Norte region using a linguistically and culturally responsive approach. At the core of this RPP is the Sol y Agua game, a bilingual, culturally- and environmentally-relevant educational game developed at the University of Texas at El Paso to introduce computing and STEM topics in middle school. The Sol y Agua RPP includes some critical areas for a successful RPP, including partnership building and the focus on a linguistically and culturally-responsive pedagogy and content development. We describe our approach to build a sustainable RPP, incorporating bilingual pedagogy, and integrating CT through a culturally- and environmentally-relevant game as part of our RPP experience.