So much has happened since October. After our school participated in Hour of Code for the first time, I attended a Code.org training. The workshop was so good that I encouraged our district media and technology director to get the trainer to come to our district. The workshop equipped us with the confidence to teach computer science skills to our elementary students. It also helped us understand why computer science should be taught in every school. Over 600,000 job openings are available in computer science, but only 43,000 computer science students graduated to fill the positions, last year. The average pay for computer science jobs is triple what teachers make.
Each participant was given an instructor handbook with lesson plans. I am now integrating some of the Code Studio lessons into my library lessons. The most recent unplugged activity was Building a Foundation. I used it to help third graders make a connection with finding the theme in a story. After doing the activity, students shared what they learned from the activity. Some said that teamwork made the task easier. Others said they had to keep trying (persistence and perseverance). Perseverance happened to be our Character Ed word for the month. While some students said problem solving or trial and error was the theme. The next time I do this lesson, I will get the students to add their theme to AnswerGarden to make a word cloud.
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| Will it work? |
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| Determination is also a theme for this activity. |
