Essentially there are four parts to computational thinking as aforementioned which can be applied to any problem.
Decomposition - Breaking a problem into smaller parts so you may divide a task.
Pattern Recognition - Finding similarities and differences in order to make predictions
Abstraction - Identifying the general principles that generate the patterns
Algorithm Design - Developing the step by step instructions to solve problems.
Don’t get me wrong. Computational Thinking definitely lends itself to computer science and opens the doors to coding and robotics. You will certainly need to embrace technology if you wish to go any further than teaching and learning the process of Computational Thinking.
Why are we doing all of this? Haven’t we already got enough in the curriculum? I hear you say…
Yes the curriculum is overcrowded, but governments around the world see this as an essential skill in the 21st Century workforce. If you need evidence around it’s place in our society simply take look at the look at the world's top companies and richest individuals. You will see the Apple’s and Google’s of the world fill out a large portion of those lists, and all exist on the fundamentals of Computational Thinking.
In essence we need to turn our kids from technology consumers to creators. And Computational Thinking allows us to make this change.
If you would like to learn all out Computational Thinking for Educators I would strongly recommend you partake in this great free course from Google.
from my experience Computational Thinking is a worthwhile problem solving skill for anyone, and certainly something teachers shouldn't fear.
I acknowledge coding and robotics is a long stretch for most to get their head around but it is not an essential part of Computational Thinking and shouldn't put you and your students off from taking the first steps into a new realm of teaching and learning opportunities.