The Situated Nature of a Computer Science Teacher’s Persistent Engagement Over a Decade: A Lines of Practice Perspective of Learning, Teaching, and Leading

Authors

• Deborah A. Fields, Utah State UniversityFollow
• Yasmin B. Kafai, University of PennsylvaniaFollow
• Joanna Goode, University of OregonFollow
• Yanil De La Rosa, University of Pennsylvania

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Learning, Culture and Social Interaction

Volume

58

Publisher

Elsevier BV

Publication Date

4-3-2026

Journal Article Version

Accepted Manuscript

First Page

1

Last Page

21

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Abstract

Helping students to engage with computational thinking has been a central focus of computer science (CS) education in schools. Much less attention has been given to how teachers situate their learning and teaching within the changing landscape of computer science education. To better understand the situated nature of teaching computational thinking, we analyze the development of one CS teacher over 12 years through a “lines of practice” framing, considering the teacher’s personalpreferences and layered conditions that shape persistent engagement in teaching. The teacher, Lydia (a pseudonym), is a nationally board-certified high school teacher in a metropolitan West Coast city in the United States with 20 years of teaching experience, including 12 in CS. We analyzed 13 interviews between 2016 and 2024 to examine and build a case study of Lydia's lines of practice in teaching, and open-coded data to develop a timeline of key influences shaped by her educational and family history, personal values, CS communities of practice, resources, and educational policies. The findings highlight the situated and dynamic interplay between personal experiences, institutional changes, and evolving educational policies in coming to understand and teach computational thinking. Lydia’s agency in adapting to students' needs underscores how equity-driven teachers navigate complex systems to create inclusive and responsive CS learning environments in a rapidly changing educational landscape.

Recommended Citation

Fields, Deborah, Kauai, Yasmin, Goode, Joanna, and De La Rosa, Yanil “The Situated Nature of a Computer Science Teacher’s Persistent Engagement over a Decade: A Lines of Practice Perspective of Learning, Teaching, and Leading.” Learning, Culture and Social Interaction, vol. 58, 23 Mar. 2026, pp. 1–21, https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lcsi.2026.101005.