Seeding Future Scientists with Computational Thinking Through the Smart Greenhouse Project
Helen Zhang, David W. Jackson, Sheikh Ahmad Shah, Kerri Beal, Jaai Uday Phatak, Mike Barnett · Science Scope · 2025
Policymakers, educators, and administrators have been calling for innovative approaches of teaching computation in classrooms of all disciplines. In this article, we report a two-week project where students are exposed to computation through building and programming an automated tabletop greenhouse to grow plants and designing their own scientific investigations using the greenhouses. The project features physical computing and block-based coding to provide an authentic and relevant experience in middle school science classrooms. Students learn to program the micro:bit microcontroller to collect data from various sensors and use actuators to control and manipulate the environmental conditions to grow their plants best (e.g., turning on the grow light when the light level is low). We have implemented the project in eighth-grade science classrooms among over 2000 students. The results showed that students were highly engaged, and teachers reported that many students who normally were not engaged in science classrooms actively participated in this project. This Smart Greenhouse project provides a working example of how to leverage the hands-on nature of physical computing and syntax-free programming to create an exciting experience to expose students to programming and modern scientific investigations at the middle school level.