Mapping Empathy in the Computer Science Classroom

Empathy is a humanistic skill, a capacity that allows us to perceive other people's emotions, putting ourselves under their perspective [1]. The study of empathy is highlighted as a tool to provide a better understanding of people's thoughts, feelings and how they affect behavior [2]. Being aware of that, a design company created the Empathy Map (EM), which is usually employed in the initial phase of the Design Thinking process to understand user's concerns, feelings and aspirations [3]. Teaching practices known as student-centered, inherited from the constructivist school, are not new [4]. Several educators have applied these approaches inside the Computer Science (CS) classroom [5]. A key to success in CS education is the construction of the computational thinking [5]. Learning to program is not an easy task and the process is surrounded by several emotional reactions such as frustration, anxiety, happiness and others [6]. In this sense, EMs can be useful to capture student's feelings, guiding educators strategies during CS classes. Here, I describe the experience of using the EM inside the Computer Science classroom at the University Center Barão de Mauá. The process of building EMs involves the description of the persona, who, in this case, are the students of a given year in the CS course. In the center of EM, the picture of a student is drawn and the surrounding region is divided into 4 areas [3, 7]: 1) THINK and FEEL - What are the students thinking/feeling? 2) HEAR and SEE - What are the students hearing/seeing? 3) SAY and DO - What are the students saying/doing? 4) PAIN/CHALLENGES and GAINS - What are the challenges the students are facing? Is there anything painful to do? How do they measure success? The EM was performed in two different stages of the CS course: in the first and third years. The students were asked to build the EM, representing their feelings and aspirations about CS. The EM of the first year showed: 1) THINK and FEEL - "thinking about the future", "feeling fear", "curiosity", "insecurity", "confusion". 2) HEAR and SEE - " hearing positive statements from family and friends", "seeing themselves in a trainee program", "working or doing a master's degree", "developing themselves". They also reported to hear that CS is very difficult. 3) SAY and DO - They say learning is difficult, They do study and work; 4) PAIN/CHALLENGES - they report feeling insecure about finishing the course and find a position. The main challenge is to conciliate both working and studies. The students of the third year reported: 1) THINK and FEEL - "thinking about the future", "feeling anxiety", "anger", "tiredness", "worry"; 2) HEAR and SEE - " they hear that CS is a promising career", "see opportunities and/or lack of them". They reported hear questions about what they will do in the future; 3) SAY and DO - "procrastinating and working"; 4) PAIN/CHALLENGES - The pain reported refers to the anxiety of completing the course and the excessive procrastination. The main challenge reported was to set medium/short term goals as study to complete tasks in the CS course. As a conclusion, we highlight that the first year students were more motivated about their future, whereas the third year are tired and anxious about finishing the course. The EM construction was able to show student's feelings and pains about the course, allowing the educator to capture the student's perspectives. Based on that, it may be possible to conduct a more appropriate learning plan to manage how emotional aspects can influence the learning process. As a future work, EM will be used along with specific subjects in a qualitative study, considering subjects with highest failure rates in CS curriculum.