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So happy to celebrate Hour of code

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Scratch is a free programming language and online community where you can create your own interactive stories, games, and animations.

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Coding for Kids 2: How Computer Programs Work.

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Coding for Kids 1: What is Computer Coding?

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Early years unplugged intro

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This Spring Term I was invited to work with staff at Heymann School, Nottinghamshire, who were preparing for Science Technology project. My role was to share and support in ways their early years pupils could engage with coding and control skills.

I champion a place for unplugged computing in the curriculum as it secures language, vocabulary, children's internal decision making, recording and visualising their own inner-computing.
To read more about computational thinking, coding and how it supports you to plan for The Characteristics of Effective Learning and thinking skills, you can also read this more recent post of mine. Vocabulary.
As with grammar, phonics, mathematics and other subject areas, the vocabulary of computing is equally as important. Teaching coding in foundation is also a great way to assess the use of new vocabulary in the communication and language area of learning!
Set the Scene.
In my classroom, teaching coding skills fits well in our 'How does...' topic. 'How do robots work?'. This action song from The Learning Station is a great place to start with thinking how robots work and in what ways they move.

Here are a sequence of linked activities or lessons, progressing from unplugged to plugged in coding.
Move like a Machine: Performing Algorithms - unplugged.
This works with the whole class or group. Display a symbol code and act it out as human beebots or robots.

What shapes do you make? Which shape would made a square? Which shape would this symbol code make?

With early years children, my codes only use forwards and quarter turns whilst we are unplugged. When I introduce the beebot or programable toy later, I have already taught that the eyes of the beebot are always facing forward. For older age groups and more secure children, you can go deeper in to unplugged coding with backward steps.

This role play secures children in visualising the symbol code in to physical actions and directions.
Crack the Code - unplugged.

can you match the symbol code to the maze?

Children practise counting the grid with a wheeled toy and find a symbol code with matches the instructions they have visualised. This links the physical instructions to the written language.

In early years, I break down, or chunk, the sections of the grid mazes. We will write a symbol code and act out these instructions in chunks first. We write the first section of the maze. Test it. Then clear it from our board. Then we write the next section. Test it. Then clear it from our boards. This is pre-teaching the function of the ' clear ' button on the beebot programable toy.
Where does code come from? - Unplugged, use a wheeled toy to test your code.

can you generate your own symbol code for the maze?

Having read and sorted the written symbol codes, it is now the children's turn to count the grid mazes and write their own.

Can you design your own map for Little Red Riding Hood's car to get her through the woods to Granny's house? Can you write the symbol code and program the wheeled car?

In the work sample above, the child has understood the function of forwards even though the track goes from left to right. The arrows depict pressing the forwards button on a programmable toy.
Recognising misconceptions.
This is where we plug in and use a programable toy like a beebot. It is also where any misconceptions manifest. However, having spent greater time visualising symbol codes and learning directions and orientation on a large scale, coding on to a programable toy will come easier.

There are two common misconceptions that I have seen before teaching unplugged first. The first misconception is the use of the clear button. In our unplugged activities we are physically clearing our boards. When first using a beebot, have the children use wipe boards to record their code and test it in chunks first. This brings the unplugged skills in to the plugged-in computing.The second misconception is the correct use of 'turn', followed by 'forward'. The acting out of symbol code has given a good start for visualising direction and returning to this strategy on the grid helps to solve the problem.
Applying the skills beyond a BeeBot.
In our continuous provision children can practise the skills of coding at different levels using these apps. Here is a suggested progression across the 4 apps, staying within the early levels of each app.

To read more about computational thinking, coding and how it support you to plan for The Characteristics of Effective Learning and thinking skills, read this more recent post of mine. New for 2019: Physical Coding Mats and Card Sets for Early Years
Role play like a robot and give instructions or sequences of commands to navigate this maze or tiles. Arrange the tiles in a grid or pathway, using wall strips to block the route and add obstacles.

Learn more about this resource here.
Enabling Environments: A Computing Curriculum Beginning in Early Years
This book has been written for the Early Years practitioner or Computing Coordinator of a school looking to further embed the use of technology in their Foundation 1 and Foundation 2 settings. Marc Faulder, an Early Years teacher and Apple Distinguished Educator, provides a complete skills curriculum from 30 months to the Early Learning Goal in this book. Chapters introduce a skills curriculum, the assessment and progression of the skills and a thorough planning document to show how technology enhances learning in all Early Learning Goals.

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This Spring Term I was invited to work with staff at Heymann School, Nottinghamshire, who were preparing for Science Technology project. My role was to share and support in ways their early years pupils could engage with coding and control skills. I champion a place for unplugged computing in the curriculum as it secures language, vocabulary,...

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Anyone can learn computer science. Make games, apps and art with code.

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The Hour of Curiosity is a set of free lesson plans, professional development activities, videos and more developed to support student engagement, 21st century education and STEAM via @mraspinall.

Check out what our friends across the bay are doing to provide computer science for ALL students. CSinSF has a TON of great resources along with a PLAN and implementation guide for providing all students with computer science education.

Thanks for reading! Hope you found the resources useful.

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Please feel free to contact me anytime.

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The Hour of Code is Dec 4-10! - Resources, links & ideas to get your students coding. by Karly Moura | This newsletter was created with Smore, an online tool for creating beautiful newsletters for educators, nonprofits, businesses and more

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Take Apart - Parts and purposes of machines

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Take Apart - Parts and purposes of machines

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Bring in old broken electronics to take them apart!

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As a group of teachers at our school, we are nearing the end of the Harvard Project Zero - Teaching and Learning in the Maker Centred Classroom course. It has all been great and will take plenty of time to digest and work out the best ways to bring these ideas and approaches to the wider school community. The main focus of the course, and the Agency by Design project, is on a set of thinking routines that encourage the students to look closely, explore complexity and find opportunity

One particular thinking routine has really stuck with me as something that is simple, powerful and easy to apply in lots of ways. That thinking routine is called Parts, Purposes and Complexities.

This routine is all about looking closely and is designed to help students slow down and make careful, detailed observations by encouraging them to look beyond the obvious features of an object or system. This thinking routine helps stimulate curiosity, raises questions, and surfaces areas for further inquiry.

Students look at a system or object and ask:

For the course I had students working on an existing making project to build a game controller by looking at existing commercial Game Controllers. If time allows and it's appropriate it is great to ask the students to actually take apart the item.

I was able to pick up a box of broken video game controllers from ebay for cheap. Students worked in groups of 3 or 4 to disassemble them. They took all the parts they found and glued them to a board. On the board they then labelled the parts, purposes and complexities in different colours. Initial points I noticed was that students don't have that much experience taking things apart with screwdrivers and cutting tools. This was fine, it just added an extra bit of time needed for this routine.

Once they had identified everything they could they took an iPad and recorded a quick video of their group talking about their insights and puzzles. This showed some really interesting conversations they had had as groups during the process and highlighted their sensitivity to design as well as their knowledge.

As well as being a fun and memorable activity for the students it has really made them think deeper and explore design more when designing their own controllers.

I've been using this routine in other places as well and sometimes just using bits of it. The image below shows Year 1 students looking closely at the parts and purposes of robots they built in the Robot Factory app on iPad.

Other teachers on the same course have been using this routine in other areas completely away from edtech. Below are some students looking closely at tomatoes to examine the parts, their purposes and how the parts work together to make it complex.

I can see this routine working well for larger designed and human systems as well. Another routine called Parts, People and Interactions is a useful follow up but did highlight some issues with students having a lack of experience of the people involved in systems.

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Parts, Purposes and Complexities - A useful thinking routine

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As a group of teachers at our school, we are nearing the end of the Harvard Project Zero - Teaching and Learning in the Maker Centred Classroom course. It has all been great and will take plenty of time to digest and work out the best ways to bring these ideas and approaches to the wider school community.

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Works best on laptops. Great for mid to upper elem

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Step by step instructions for creating your own app

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Step by step instructions for creating your own app

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upper elem on laptops

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Bitsbox: a new way to introduce kids to computer programming

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Bitsbox: a new way to introduce kids to computer programming

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Bitsbox: a new way to introduce kids to computer programming

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A code.org featured activity, Bitsbox provides monthly projects that teach gradeschoolers how to program apps. Try it now for free at Bitsbox.com.

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unplugged activity for upper elem

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Unplugged activity for all ages

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Program Lightbot to light up all of the blue squares!

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Unplugged coding

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Anyone can learn computer science. Make games, apps and art with code.

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Unplugged coding activity for all ages

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Teaching iteration with unplugged coding

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Teaching iteration with unplugged coding

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Great for all ages

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Loops are a handy way of describing actions that repeat a certain numbers of times. In this lesson, students will practice converting sets of actions into a single loop.

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laptop required

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Minecraft Generation AI

Venture through time to create your AI-powered inventions! The new Minecraft Hour of Code tutorial is now available in Minecraft Education for Windows, Mac, Chromebook, iPad and Mobile. Get started with free educator resources, trainings, and videos.

Get started

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Use your creativity and problem solving skills to explore and build underwater worlds with code.

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Amazing list of resources from CSEd Week

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Amazing list of resources from CSEd Week

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The Hour of Code is a global movement reaching tens of millions of students. One-hour tutorials are available in 45+ languages for all ages.

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CSEdWeek is an annual call to action to inspire K-12 students to learn computer science, advocate for equity, and celebrate the contributions of students, teachers, and partners to the field.

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The technologies that computer scientists produce are all around us. Think about all the technology that you encounter in your day:

▪ The tablet you were using to watch a video after breakfast has been programmed.

▪ The traffic lights on the pedestrian crossing you used to get to school have been programmed to help you get safety across the road.

▪ The bus you took to go swimming after school has an engine management system that is programmed.

▪ The CCTV camera that was watching you in the supermarket has been programmed to move automatically and store images.

Future innovations

Technology advances constantly and people are always working on new and inventive ways to use it.

These include hardware innovations like wearable technology such as smart watches, new interface methods and new software such as voice recognition, machine translation and predictive analytics.

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The technologies that computer scientists produce are all around us. Think about all the technology that you encounter in your day: ▪ The tablet you were using to watch a video after breakfast has been programmed. ▪ The traffic lights on the pedestrian crossing you used to get to school have been programmed to help you get safety across the road.