Practices of information education with Squeak toward the secure improvement of 'academic ability'

Abstract

This work describes a curriculum of information education using Squeak at Horikawa High School, which is specified as "Super Science High School (SSH)" where teachers try innovative teaching methods to stimulate students' interests in science. This curriculum aims to achieve the objectives of a subject "information study" specified by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. We consider that Squeak can provide powerful environments where students can think and try confirming the results visually, and the environments are ideal for them to learn how to design and evaluate graphical user interface. We introduce the first effort to create a curriculum for a subject "basic inquiry" in SSH.