Computation is a general term for information processing. Computational thinking is an approach to solving problems that is informed by computer science and mathematics and chiefly addresses the questions: What is computable?' and 'How do we compute it?' We also ask: 'What can computers do best?' and 'What can humans do better than computers?'
| Jeannette Wing | Jeannette Wing Video | Computational Thinking Presentation |
| Five Deep Questions | Centre for Computational Thinking | CT in high school |
| Report on Workshop on CT | Alan Bundy on CT | Peter Denning |
"Computational thinking involves solving problems, designing systems, and understanding human behaviour, by drawing on the concepts fundamental to computer science."
When confronted by a problem to be solved we have to ask questions like: How difficult is it to solve? What’s the best way to solve it? Estimating the difficulty of the problem will reference an appreciation of the complexity and the time and resources required to solve problems of this nature.
"Computational thinking is reformulating a seemingly difficult problem into one we know how to solve, perhaps by reduction, embedding, transformation, or simulation."
CS4FN Logical Thinking: Kakuro, Pixel Puzzle, Code Breaking,
Computational thinking is:
"Computer science’s contribution to biology goes beyond the ability to search through vast amounts of sequence data looking for patterns. The hope is that data structures and algorithms—our computational abstractions and methods—can represent the structure of proteins in ways that elucidate their function. Computational biology is changing the way biologists think."
One recent TV program about the DNA of neanderthals likened the process of reconstructing neanderthal DNA to finding the text of War and Peace in a pile of 20 finely shredded novels and where the searcher had no idea what War and Peace looked like. This is a startling application of computational thinking to a problem in another scientific discipline. Computer science has largely invented computational biology, bioinformatics, computational genomics, computational biomodeling, biocybernetics and others.
"Similarly, computational game theory is changing the way economists think; nanocomputing, the way chemists think; and quantum computing, the way physicists think."
"This kind of thinking will be part of the skill set of not only other scientists but of everyone else. Ubiquitous computing is to today as computational thinking is to tomorrow. Ubiquitous computing was yesterday’s dream that became today’s reality; computational thinking is tomorrow’s reality."
"Many people equate computer science with computer programming. Some parents see only a narrow range of job opportunities for their children who major in computer science. Many people think the fundamental research in computer science is done and that only the engineering remains. Computational thinking is a grand vision to guide computer science educators, researchers, and practitioners as we act to change society’s image of the field. We especially need to reach the pre-college audience, including teachers, parents, and students, sending them two main messages:
Intellectually challenging and engaging scientific problems remain to be understood and solved. The problem domain and solution domain are limited only by our own curiosity and creativity; and: One can major in computer science and do anything. One can major in English or mathematics and go on to a multitude of different careers. Ditto computer science. One can major in computer science and go on to a career in medicine, law, business, politics, any type of science or engineering, and even the arts."
Quotations from Computational Thinking by Jeannette Wing
We shall be developing our computational thinking skills as we learn more techniques and apply them to a range of problems.