Professional Learning Goals

• Developed a deeper pedagogical knowledge and understanding of coding, problem-solving and differentiation through shared professional knowledge
• Integrated technology in the classroom to develop 21^st century learners that will “shape our world”
• Better understood the different coding applications students will be using in class to solve problems
• Increased student engagement through collaboration, inquiry, creativity, communication and citizenship
• Used hands-on tools to meet students’ learning needs
• Allowed students to express their knowledge in a variety of forms that best-suited their interests and learning needs
• Gave students more autonomy to direct their own learning
• Stepped out of our comfort zone to challenge ourselves to lead by example so that students were motivated to learn and observe their teachers learning as well
• Decreased the reluctance of students to try new things allowing students to express their knowledge in a way that best-suited their own particular learning style

Activities and Resources

As a group, we investigated the different apps and robots we were interested in learning more about. We read some of the benefits of coding prior to beginning our project and attended some additional conferences and professional development sessions outside of the school. These conferences/workshops sparked some curiosity in wanting to learn more in order to bring this excitement and curiosity into our classroom and into the hands of our students. We felt this would improve their critical/logical thinking skills, develop problem-solving skills and build collaboration.

We began by developing goals, brainstorming some of the apps/programs and resources we wanted to purchase, and developing an action plan on the execution of our project. Then we divided up the apps/robots/programs: Hopscotch, Scratch, Swift Playground, Dash and Dot. As a group we then brought what we learned back to the group and shared each of the different programs with the group. We determined which of the programs we wanted to focus on and how we were going to bring them into the classroom. We decided to honour the world-wide Hour of Code by supporting classroom teachers in our first annual school-wide Hour of Code.

During the Hour of Code, we had students go to other classrooms and demonstrate the programs, robots, etc. and provide interactive opportunities to utilize these programs. Students worked collaboratively to solve problems such as having the Sphero draw a square or begin learning the basics of coding through guided instruction of Lightbot.

We also provided an interactive carousel workshop for staff at a staff meeting. Staff were exposed to coding and were able to ask questions.

As the Team Lead, I created a Leadership presentation that was presented to the Board entitled “Leadership, Improving Student Learning by Advocating and Guiding with Experience.” This was well-received.

Rethinking the Coding Craze – https://unfoldlearning.net/2017/01/02/rethinking-the-coding-craze/

Edtopia Articles

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/add-coding-elementary-curriculum-now-matt-harrell

https://www.edutopia.org/discussion/coded-success-benefits-learning-program

Osmo Genius Kit (Numbers, Letters, Tangrams, Coding)

https://www.playosmo.com/static/downloads/teachers_guide.pdf

https://my.playosmo.com/en/help

http://yoursmarticles.blogspot.ca/2014/10/making-most-of-osmo.html#.WNAasG8rKM8

https://my.playosmo.com/forum/lessonplan

Dash and Dot – Wondershare

Code-a-pillar – Interactive Caterpillar suitable for primary

Sphero

https://mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/?ui=2&ik=aaf1e9dbc0&view=att&th=158f87db06b29162&attid=0.1&disp=inline&safe=1&zw

MIP Robot and App

Parrot Drone

GoPro

Apps – Swift Playground, Box Island, Scratch Junior, Lightbot, Hopscotch

Scratch for PC – http://brianaspinall.com/scratch-tutorials-playlist/

Hour of Code – https://code.org/learn

We had a school-wide Hour of Code. We asked some of our students who were familiar with some of the coding programs and robots such as Dash and Dot to go into the classrooms and do short presentations on the program and have students interact with the coding applications. Some of the classrooms focused on the different apps available such as Lightbot and Swift Playground to begin learning about coding.

As a group, we visited classrooms and gave brief introductions to the programs resources we gathered such as coding in Osmo. This was a very successful venture. Students were engaged, participated and asked teachers to code the next day and in the weeks following.

https://www.raspberrypi.org/magpi-issues/Essentials_Minecraft_v1.pdf

OTF Webinars – Computational Thinking and Coding in Math and Literacy (K-8), Get into Coding Shape in Math Class, Developing Computational Thinking Through Coding

OTF Summer Institute – July 25–27, Niagara-on-the-Lake Computational Thinking & Coding in Math and Literacy (K-8)

ETFO Webinars

https://etfo2.adobeconnect.com/p8wup2rbrxe/ ​

Apple Store Workshops London, Ontario

Swift Playground, Hour of Code

Unexpected Challenges

Some of the challenges we faced included:

• One of our participants left the school and took an acting administrative position
• Scratch only works on PCs and there are a limited number of PCs available in the classrooms
• Staff were hesitant incorporating this into their program as they were not well-versed in coding and felt it may be difficult to learn
• Setting up the banking and release time
• Board put policy in place regarding the use of drones on board property
• Gaining confidence in our own ability to create and utilize the technology and develop lesson plans tied to the curriculum. Making the tool more than a game/toy and more of a learning tool.
• Time restrictions allowed us the opportunity to explore the programs and apps but restricted us from having enough time to create actual lessons. However, we believe this could be more of an inquiry opportunity through something like Genius Hour.
• Wanting more time to explore the different ways of incorporating the different resources into our math programs
• Waiting for the remainder of the budget to purchase the rest of our resources

Enhancing Student Learning and Development

• Helped motivate and engage students through technology because robots are a cool way of learning
• Allowed students the use of hands-on learning tools and engages different types of learners
• Allowed students to work collaboratively with partners, and group and individual tasks
• Allowed students to problem-solve and direct their own learning
• Allowed for creativity among students
• Glitches with the technology purchased (MIP did not function properly)
• Allowed leadership opportunities for some of the students by sharing their knowledge with other classrooms
• Incorporating more technology increased student engagement as it made learning more fun and interactive
• Allowed teachers to learn alongside students and problem-solve together
• Allowed differentiated instruction for those who do not learn in the traditional manner
• Digitally recorded and photographed students utilizing the apps/programs/robots and gave teacher-directed and peer-directed feedback immediately

Sharing

• We have already shared our knowledge with students during the Hour of Code
• We shared the different apps and resources within our teacher learning group
• We have developed a carousel of workshops for staff at a staff meeting
• We are available to assist colleagues if they have questions
• We have shared our learning with board personnel
• We will continue to share our knowledge at staff meetings and professional development sessions

Project Evaluation

• We were highly successful in engaging students and motivating them to use coding in the classroom
• We look forward to continuing this journey and creating lessons to use in the classroom
• We look forward to seeing how far our students will be able to go in solving problems and sharing their knowledge with the use of coding
• Next steps would be to continue to spread our knowledge to other classrooms, spend more time investigating other ways of incorporating coding into the curriculum and investigate the Code Girl Code program