Defensive climate in the computer science classroom

As part of an NSF-funded IT Workforce grant, the authors conducted ethnographic research to provide deep understanding to the learning environment of computer science classrooms. Categories emerging from data analysis included communication patterns leading to an impersonal environment and guarded behavior, and the creation and maintenance of informal hierarchy resulting in competitive behaviors. These communication patterns lead to a defensive environment, characterized by competitiveness rather cooperation, judgments about others, superiority, and neutrality rather than empathy. The authors identify particular and recognizable types of discourse, which, when prevalent in a classroom, can preclude the development of a collaborative and supportive learning environment.

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2002
• Where: SIGCSE
• Authors: Lecia Jane Barker, Kathy Garvin-Doxas, Michele H. Jackson
• Keywords: Communication Patterns, Education, Impersonal Environment, Learning Environment, SIGCSE 2002