Tier 1 Instructional Strategies To Improve K-4 Reading Comprehension
Category: Student Learning
Instrument Overview
Expert Notes AvailableView expert commentary on strengths and cautions for this instrument
Strengths
Uses a hands-on, manipulable physical system to elicit children’s reasoning, allowing researchers to directly observe how preschoolers infer and test causal relationships rather than relying solely on verbal explanations or abstract questions.
Cautions
Only applies to apply to coding applications that use block-based programing, e.g. ScratchJr; measures outcome only, not process of creating coding projects; have not yet tested how easily teachers can use the rubric
Evaluates coding skills and project design across 13 categories. Unahalekhaka & Bers (2022) validated with 228 ScratchJr projects.
Unahalekhaka & Bers (2022) developed the first version, "ScratchJr Project Rubric"; Blake-West et al. (2025) redesigned the rubric to treat creative coding as a single underlying construct (as opposed to project design and coding concepts separately).
Organization
Topic
Collection Category(ies)
Content
Grades
Kindergarten,
1st Grade,
2nd Grade
Languages
English
Respondent
Student
Administration Information
Length
7 items
Administration
Computer
Access and Use
Developer
Blake-West et al. (2025)
Price
No fee
Contact
Jessica Blake-West: jess.blake-west@bc.edu
Boston College Lynch School of Education and Human Development, Chestnut Hill, MA, USA
Psychometrics (additional guidance)
Psychometric References
Blake-West, J., Alrawashdeh, G., & Bers, M. (2025). Validating a Creative Coding Rubric through expressive activities for elementary grades. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 57(6), 1350–1369. https://doi.org/10.1080/15391523.2024.2398502
Unahalekhaka, A., & Bers, M. U. (2022). Evaluating young children's creative coding: rubric development and testing for ScratchJr projects. Education and information technologies, 27(5), 6577–6597. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-021-10873-w
Item Type
Task
Populations of Validation
Early elementary learners (K–2) engaged in creative, project-based coding activities
