Teaching Computational Thinking to Science Majors

This paper describes the development and initial evaluation of a new course ”Introduction to Computational Thinking” taken by science majors to fulfill a college computing requirement. The course was developed by computer science faculty in collaboration with science faculty and it focuses on the role of computing and computational principles in scientific inquiry. It uses Python and Python libraries to teach computational thinking via basic programming concepts, data management concepts, simulation, and visualization. Projects drawn from different scientific disciplines are complemented with lectures from faculty in these areas. Our initial evaluation indicates that the problem-driven approach focused on scientific discovery and computational principles increases the student’s interest in computing.