Cultivating computational thinking (CT) in higher education remains challenging. Despite diverse pedagogical practices, CT’s abstract and multifaceted nature often hinders effective teaching and assessment. Knowledge building (KB) positions students as active constructors of knowledge who collaboratively create artifacts—objects to think with—that help externalize and refine their CT understanding and practices. Although KB shows promise for enhancing CT, its pedagogical use in higher education is still underexplored. This study proposes a framework for designing a knowledge building environment (KBE) based on KB theory that represents CT through artifact creation and evaluates its effectiveness in supporting undergraduates’ CT development from both process- and outcome-oriented perspectives. Forty-eight undergraduates from a Chinese university were randomly assigned to ten groups. Each group, guided by KB principles, engaged in problem-solving within the designed KBE to create computational artifacts through CT tasks. Data were collected from online discourse, pre- and post-test CT competency scales, and final artifacts. We employed nonparametric tests and correlation analysis to examine the data. Findings from both process and outcome data show that engaging in CT tasks—abstraction & decomposition, data practices, algorithmic thinking, automation, modeling, & simulation, and evaluation & generalization—within a well-designed KBE significantly improved students’ CT skills. The analysis revealed differences in student engagement and performance on these CT tasks, as reflected in their discourse and group products. Following their participation in CT tasks within the KBE, students’ CT competencies—algorithmic thinking, cooperativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving—improved significantly, whereas creativity showed no comparable gains. Our study found a significant positive correlation between undergraduates’ engagement in CT tasks and their performance on computational artifacts, but no such correlation with their perceived CT competencies. This study informs CT instruction grounded in KB theory that fosters undergraduates’ CT development and emphasizes the use of combined assessment approaches to better understand their learning within KBEs.
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