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This paper describes the Automata for STEM Erasmus+ project, its aims and activities, in particularly spontaneous cooperation between children while participating in automata construction workshops. Taking as a starting point the need to motivate students in the areas of science and mathematics at an early age and also the characteristics of automata, that involving two parts, a narrative and a mechanism, the Automata for STEM project aims to explore automata as a strategy to plan and implement contextualized and interdisciplinary activities which involve reference to science concepts or phenomena. The AutoSTEM framework is based on the role of play in learning, as well as observation, collaboration, construction and experimentation according to what is proposed by the socio-cognitive, socio-constructivist and socio-constructionist theories. The present work focuses on the analysis of spontaneous cooperation between children who participate in project's workshops. Five workshops were considered, with approx. 20 children each, from six to nine years old. The pedagogical general method followed in all the workshops involved the presentation of prototypes and mechanisms and children being challenged to plan and construct their own automata. However, there were some differences in the workshops: in four of them, a poem about the earth was presented, one of the workshops took place in the library, with the children working on small groups, while the others occurred in class, with children seating in pairs or in large classroom arrangement. Teachers scaffolded the process, however in the library workshop there was a minimum of instructions, while in the classroom workshop several instructions were presented. Data were gathered through participant observation, registering field notes, photos and videos. Based on the data analysis five cases of spontaneous cooperation were identified: Case 1. Developing individual projects while sharing materials, ideas, experiences; Case 2. An idea that spread: the group influence face; Case 3. Ideas in pairs: the role of class organization; Case 4. Deciding to work in group and solving the authorship: the automata belongs to the class, Case 5. Negative interactions. In summary, the cases described pointed that despite the characteristics of cooperative work were not formal established, spontaneous cooperation between children emerged. This spontaneous cooperation can take different features, namely to decide to work on the same prototype or to develop their own prototype while cooperating in informal way with colleagues. In this case, cooperation can be seen in dimensions as observing each other work, sharing materials, to help with the construction, to imitate and being inspired by the colleagues’ work. Some conflict situations were also observed. Spontaneous cooperation also varied according the children age, the context, structure and organization of the workshop, e.g. the seating arrangement. The mechanism used seems not associated with the characteristics of the cooperation.
Keywords: automata construction, spontaneous cooperation, children, STEM.
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