Category: EdTech Inquiry

For students who want to start designing their own projects on different platforms, Youtube has a lot of great tutorials to help guide students to create their own projects. For instance, I was able to follow a “coding train” tutorial video to create my own coding masterpiece that demonstrates my understanding of fractals. (If I can do this anyone can)

Not only did this particular YouTuber explain the math and physics as to how this would work but he also explained what every part of his code did as well as go through the process of computational thinking and debugging in the video. He sets his video up as challenges and makes the process easy to understand from the perspective of someone with limited knowledge. I did all of this in processing which is a java based processor that was free to download.

Able to show Understanding of…. 

• While loop: when the condition is evaluated first and if it returns true then the statements inside while loop execute. When condition returns false, the control comes out of the loop and jumps to the next statement after a while loop.
• Boolean: A Boolean value is one with two choices you can assign a value of either true or false. There is a variable type for Boolean values. 
• If statement: if statements are used to test a condition (ex. If … then do this)
• Able to show that Fractals are complex patterns that are self-similar across different scales. They are created by repeating a simple process over and over in an ongoing loop. 

This is an example of how coding can pull together multiple subjects like math, physics, art, science and computer science.  

I went on code BC’s website and learned about who they were and what they did.

Code BC provides a fantastic web-based workshop on the topic of  Computational Thinking. Computer Using Educators of BC (CUEBC) hosts a yearly conference that brings together 500+ K-12 teachers from across BC. They encourage teachers who are not technology specialist to be a part of CUEBC who want to implement the purposeful and beneficial integration of technology into their practice. They believe in supporting teachers by providing them with extensive outreach work, consultation, professional development, and inquiry projects. Teachers’ Guide to Computational Thinking 

I worked through one of their hour-long courses and I found it to be very valuable.

What is coding?

• Coding is the process of using a programming language to get a computer to behave how you want it to. 
• Since computers interpret instructions through binary (1s and 0s) 
• languages are used to make the process of giving instructions to a computer easier to read and the ease of creating programs. 
• A few common languages include C, C++, C#, java, and python.

Why should we teach it?

• The ability to code computer programs is an important part of literacy in today’s society and is necessary for our developing technology-based world
• Learning coding puts students in control of the computer, and builds understanding in sequencing skills, counting, problem-solving, logical thinking, cause and effect, and critical thinking
• Students can express themselves through code and create games, apps, websites, etc. The earlier students are introduced to coding, the more comfortable they will be with computers and technology in the future

In BC’s New Curriculum: Applied Design, Skills, and Technology, students in grade K-5 are expected to be able to do the following:

• • “Identify needs and opportunities for designing”
  • “Use trial and error to make changes and solve problems”
  • “Construct a first version of the product, making changes to tools, materials, and procedures as needed”
  • “Reflect on their design thinking and processes, and their ability to work effectively both as individuals and collaboratively in a group, including their ability to share and maintain a co-operative workspace”
  • “Simple algorithms that reflect computational thinking”
  • “Evolution of programming language”
  • “Visual programming”