About This Lesson
In this Grade 3 unit, Codes and Computers, the goal of instruction is for students to identify the output of any computer device as a solution to a problem and deconstruct the solution into the necessary steps required.
The key question guiding the unit is: How do programmers build computer programs?
In this grade level, the emphasis begins to shift from use—skillfully inputting information to prompt outputs—to the unseen processes inside computing technology. Students discern that computers do not think on their own to solve problems but only execute step-by-step instructions that are built into them. And they begin to dissect messages into the granular parts that make them up and transmit them. Of primary importance is understanding that a computer program must follow a correct sequence of steps, or algorithm, to both accept input and generate output.
