Agile Curriculum Development: Computational Modeling COVID-19

ABSTRACTComputational modeling provides an excellent vehicle for raising scientific awareness of emergent and topical phenomena such as COVID-19. Now more than ever, it is crucial to provide students with factual information about how diseases spread and how their own actions can impact that spread. In order to both encourage computational thinking skills and build scientific knowledge of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have created a series of programming activities through which students construct their own computational models based on the emerging scientific consensus around COVID-19. Students are able to model everyday situations such as being in a crowded area or going to stores while unknowingly infected, and immediately see the consequences of those actions. By including accurate scientific variables such as the reproductive number of the virus, incubation period, and period of communicability, students are able to create their own epi-curves that demonstrate the severity of the disease and provide students with visual representation of how quickly COVID-19 spreads. We also use the scientific model and associated modeling activities to reinforce best practices at home and in the community. Finally, this curriculum development effort demonstrates how block-based computational modeling activities lend themselves to agile curricular re-design around emerging and topics of local interest