Case Study : Habitat Schools' Guiness World Record With Cyber Square Academia

Introduction

In a session that lasted over four hours, the students from grades 4 to 12 from three Habitat Schools (International Indian School, Ajman; Habitat School, Al Jurf; and Habitat School, Al Tallah) orchestrated the record attempt online on January 10 in a video meeting, where the students shared evidence of websites they coded and created on their own under the Hallmarks of Habitat School. The celebrated coding event consisted of 2,803 students from the UAE as well as other parts of the world. With an unearthing effort from the side of the Habitat Schools as well as Cyber Square, children were able to beat the previous records that were set in Jamaica by WiPay Jamaica with 542 users on May 16, 2021. This vision and execution that have been ushered in by Habitat schools and Cyber Square have never been seen before in any other coding sector in India or in the Middle East, making it truly one of a kind. The purpose of this case study is to discuss the importance of computer science education to students in making them well equipped to achieve their world record goal.

Methodology

For the purpose of this study, the foundations that will be crossed over are based on the General Systems Theory of Ludwig Von Bertalanffy, and further emphasis is given to systemic development theory. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning and the Three Needs Theory by David McClelland can also be seen referenced in the study.

Profiles of the Study:

• Habitat Schools' Students
• Students with exposure to computers or mobile phones,

The Mindset Behind Breaking A Record

This year marks the 60th anniversary of the publication of the Guinness World Records, which includes several well-known names, like Elvis, who is still the best-selling solo artist in the world. When it comes to climbing Mount Everest, Edmund Hillary was the first person to do it in 1953. Michael Phelps shattered eight swimming world records, including the record for the most gold medals won at a single Olympics in 2008 when he competed in Beijing, China. A combination of motives, similar to those found in frivolous pursuits such as establishing strange records, is what drives an athlete to victory in a race or physical performance. There are many ways to classify human motivation, such as intrinsic vs. extrinsic, but one of the best-known is the "three wants" hypothesis, which divides it into three parts: the need for accomplishment, the need for power, and the need for a sense of belonging. Guinness World Records provides an incentive for individuals to strive for accomplishment in anything—the nature of the talent becomes secondary to the fact that it exists. Because of your desire to succeed, someone may have found a weird niche because they didn't see any other means to fulfil their need for success. The need to succeed can be deeply rooted in the mind of every individual just after they pass their early stages of mental development. Motivating a group of school-going children into attempting as well as winning a Guinness World Record can be considered an amazing feat that can be positively rewarding for their later career as well as their mental fortitude.

Positive Reinforcement Theory of Motivation

Operant conditioning theorist B. F. Skinner coined the phrase "positive reinforcement" in his writings. When a reaction or behaviour is reinforced with praise or other forms of compensation, it is more likely to be repeated. Instrumental conditioning is another name for B.F. Skinner's approach to operant conditioning, in which the consequences of a response influence the likelihood that it will be repeated. Conduct that is reinforced (rewarded) by operant conditioning is more likely to be repeated, whereas behaviour that is penalised is less likely to be repeated.

Your child's report card, or your company's bonus, serves as a kind of positive reinforcement. The more often positive reinforcement occurs, the more successful it is in influencing behaviour. That is to say, on a daily basis. Adults often go to work in order to earn money. Of course, individuals may also reap other benefits, such as a better sense of self-worth and confidence in their ability to assist others. Paychecks are the primary benefit of going to work for most people, though. They are encouraged to continue their efforts as a result of this encouragement.

When given praise and encouragement for their efforts, children, like adults, are more likely to keep up an excellent job. When children are given gratification of this range at such a young age, it will help them enormously when they grow up and consider various aspects of their future.

Dissecting the Cyber Square Academic Curriculum and how it reinforced the children of Habitat Schools

Habitat School was the first to undertake the CyberSquare academic curriculum back in 2014. The curriculum was aimed at helping children understand the proper functioning of computer science and how it can be translated directly to the real world. The gamified approach that they applied to education has also been effective in reaching a wide array of students in a class, instead of just the brighter ones like we typically see with normal academic syllabuses. The proper insight into IoT education is thought to have helped the children understand the fundamentals of computer knowledge.

The primary source of education for youngsters is the classroom. It allows kids the opportunity to learn about a wide range of disciplines, including people, literature, history, mathematics, and politics. This helps cultivate one's ability to think clearly. As a person is exposed to numerous cultural influences, his or her perspective on the world and the nature of life expands. School used to be associated with memorising facts and figures from textbooks, working through challenging arithmetic problems, and reciting poetry and sonnets. To succeed in today's world of education, a student must move beyond the old method of memorising facts by heart. Through a flexible curriculum, they learn to think for themselves and to cultivate a sense of wonder and intrigue. The child's imagination is released from the constraints of mental blockages, allowing it to run wild. Numerous references are made to the value of imagination. A well-developed cognitive system is the result of a well-balanced play environment and an all-encompassing curriculum.

Children may have a deeper understanding of how modern technology works by first learning to programme or code, one of the most fundamental aspects of computer science. It is common for children to love utilising technology, but many are unaware of how much effort is put into programming these devices by specialists.

In addition to this, teaching children to programme may help them become better problem solvers. When it comes to making smarter judgments as a youngster, kids who learn how to use their problem-solving abilities as a youngster are more likely to become well-rounded and possibly successful people in the future. Children's ability to bounce back from setbacks is enhanced when they study computer science. It is normal for youngsters to make errors when using their coding abilities in computer science-based projects.

If they want to succeed, they'll need to move on from this failure and try again. They will learn that failure is not necessarily a bad thing. This is a lesson many of us in the adult world are still struggling with today, even though we should know better. Finally, professions in computer science are here to stay. Many critical elements of infrastructure are now developed by computer scientists to perform properly since the world relies more and more on computers. Even in the commercial sector, organisations are increasingly relying on the services of competent programmers to build and maintain their websites and online databases. As a result, students who study computer technology in high school will have a leg up on their peers when it comes to getting jobs in the field when they are older.

It's practically a certainty that you'll need computer and tech skills to be successful in the profession and in general. In many situations, youngsters are gradually becoming experts in the workings of computers and other technology-based devices. Nevertheless, this does not limit what youngsters may learn about computers in the future. Because of their early exposure to technology, they have a better grasp of the intricacies of computers than most people their age.

The Importance of a School System in the Development of a Child (Systems Theory)

The school's job should be to help each student reach his or her full academic potential. Aside from the fact that its efficiency varies from school to school, teaching the alphabet and the 123s isn't adequate. Schoolwork throughout the grades is devoted to teaching children problem-solving and solution-seeking abilities that will be useful in almost every element of a child's personal and professional life when they grow up. Therefore, problem solving is an important life skill in addition to academic skills. It's the capacity to assess an issue, come up with a solution, and then re-plan to try something else if the first answer doesn't work. Even if a student fails a maths exam, the problem-solving approach pushes them to keep trying. They'll keep trying because they believe there's a solution out there; they simply haven't discovered it yet. In addition, it seems like a difficult task.

With the aid of systems thinking, it is possible to understand the educational system as a whole. Thoughtful and interesting teaching may be created by adopting a systems-thinking attitude. District and school leaders benefit from increased efficiency as a result of this initiative. It may also be used to replace fragmented ways of executing policy with planned and methodical techniques that provide success for the whole organisation.

To put it another way, teachers and school administrators may use systems thinking as a framework to arrange their classrooms and provide education. Administrators may also use systems thinking to reorganise educational institutions. As a potent teaching tool, systems thinking provides the opportunity for students to participate in the learning process. Teachers that adopt a systems thinking perspective on their lessons will be able to show their pupils how apparently diverse systems work together to create meaningful connections. Aside from deepening their topic knowledge, this also helps students develop their critical thinking skills.

A child is part of many systems throughout their life. Beginning with the family and progressing to school, colleges, and various professional organisations, But the most important organisation among all of the organisations is still found to be that of family and school. A child spends most of his young life at school. He will learn to be competent and prepare baby steps to fight the battles in his future. What we were able to observe at Habitat Schools is that the children are given a lot more challenges than required so that they can prepare for the hurdles in their future paths. When we look at a system, it functions in accordance with the structure's head; the rest of the parts in a system eventually adhere to the one in command.When we look at Habitat Schools, the head of the system seems to be reaching out for continuous ways to bring more to the students and push them in the right direction. By making 2803 students participate in a world record attempt at such a young age, the directive is given and an image is set in their minds that breaking something such as a world record can be possible if they are willing to put in the effort.

How Cyber Square’s Gamified Teaching Approach Helped To Shorten The Divide And Promote Inclusion Among Students

Like how it was mentioned earlier, the academic programme that we have seen so far has only given focus to students who were already bright enough to learn what they needed to own their own. The variable that was seen as contradictory to this was that the Cyber Squares approach to the devising of an academic syllabus was gamified so that it could also be understood by children who are not comfortable with learning from text. A gamified method of learning fundamentally refers to making youngsters familiar with topics or ideas through games. The notion of coding may be taught to youngsters via puzzles and video games, which can help them grasp the fundamentals of programming languages. When things are taught via the medium of play, both children and adults are better able to grasp and remember them.

At CyberSquare, kids may learn the basics of computer programming by playing video games in which they must complete a small coding-related challenge as they go through the game to complete the objective. Thus, the dullness of learning is removed entirely from the picture. In order to keep kids motivated, it is important to reward them immediately for their accomplishments. As an example, imagine that a youngster is playing a video game with many objectives, and one of those objectives requires them to write a line of code in order to complete. You can bet this particular piece of code will be memorised by the youngster in such a situation, and he or she will be able to employ the same strategy on future missions to obtain an edge. The ability to learn to code and improve problem-solving skills while having fun is why coding is such an enjoyable exercise for children.

How Achievement Behaviour Aids a Child

An essential element of a child's growth is the development of achievement behaviour, which aids in the development of a child's ability to be successful and a feeling of control over his surroundings. Accomplishment fosters a sense of self-worth, self-acceptance, and self-worthiness. A child's motivation and accomplishment behaviour may be affected by a variety of things. Parents, teachers, and friends are the three most important stakeholders in a child's life.

Early in life, a child's desire to succeed is fueled by a sense of accomplishment. A child's eventual academic success is strongly influenced by his or her early life circumstances. This means that a child's academic success might be influenced by their early life experiences. There is a consensus among psychologists that early experience and mastery of tasks affect motivation for accomplishment. The formation of self-esteem begins early in life and gets more established as a kid grows older. Pre-adolescence and adolescence bring with them a well-defined sense of self and a strong desire to succeed. Sensory-motor activities are the primary means of learning in the early years. In general, the behaviour is definite and particular. As a youngster grows older, his or her behaviour gets more abstract and complicated. Mastery of tasks requires focus and more frequent attempts to complete activities at this level. It's easy to learn defeat by feeling defeated and unable to do the tasks at hand, but it's the sentiments that follow failure that have the most enduring impact.

The child's own thoughts and feelings are vital, but so are the reactions of those around him. Responses from parents, teachers, and classmates are all important sources of information for a youngster. His self-esteem and will to succeed may be influenced by the expectations of those close to him as well as his own performance. When I'm discussing this with parents, I use the analogy of watering a plant in the hopes that it will bear blossoms. A child's efforts should be expected to bring fruit as well. Nothing might be more discouraging to a child than believing that his parents or peers don't believe that he can succeed at an activity.

Conclusion

The future owes its torch to the vision of young minds; Habitat School, in collaboration with Cyber Square, has been able to develop healthy means of development for children by assisting them in achieving such a great feat at such a young age.The curriculum put forward by Cyber Square has been of great importance in guiding children to receive the highest levels of computer science education in a simplified manner.