The Development of Attentional Inhibition Through Coding and Robotics: Associating Between Tinkering, Creating, and Problem Solving in a Group Setting

A global trend towards integrating coding and robotics into school curricula has been lately taking place. Integrating coding and robotics into school curricula is an essential element for the development of computational thinking for and skills of the twenty-first century. Moreover, it could help developing cognitive skills and precisely attentional inhibition which is a component of the executive functions. Children (N = 35) aged between 9 and 11 years old completed a protocol of twelve coding and robotics sessions at a rate of three sessions per week, in groups of five. The sessions presented in an enjoyable and motivating environment gave the children the opportunity to play, tinker, create and solve problems while collaborating with each other. A repeated measures plan was used and the progress in attentional inhibition was measured by psychometric tests and by structured observations. After training phase, children exhibited a better performance (p value equal to 0.003) in attentional inhibition than after control phase (p value equal to 0.041). The significant progress revealed promising results towards the development of attentional inhibition through coding and robotics group sessions.