Developing Computational Thinking, "Fad" or "Fundamental"?

Publicised by Wing and later expanded on, computational thinking purports to be the foundation of thought for coming generations, an indispensable skill-set that compulsory education must provide. The target article uses small tasks to develop skills relevant to computational science and computing, and explores the student interaction with these tasks. Useful skills may be developed by these students, but the article does not explicitly connect these tasks to computational thinking skills or competencies. This causes the reader to ask the question: are they developing computational thinking, or some other set of computer-related skills? A more fundamental question, and one beyond the scope of the target article, is what are the skills that are ultimately unique for computational thinking?