Sandra Macaulay returned to our Ed Tech class for a presentation on coding from scratch. This was interesting seeing as we just had a presentation on coding without computers from Carrie Antoniazzi. The combination of the two presentations gives me two unique perspectives on coding.
Sandra started the presentation by modelling the lesson as if we were younger students. This allowed us to see the management techniques that she uses in her classroom. For the first activity, we were given a package of cards with codes (straight, turn, hop, etc.) to be placed on the ground and followed. This was very similar to the first activity we did with Carrie Antoniazzi, which allowed me to see a common theme of coding without computers: movement. The physical movement that is incorporated into these activities makes for a fun, engaging activity.
Sandra also introduced us to the app Scratch Jr. The app allows you to create animations, text, and dictation to explain your learning. In the example given to us, the fish in the animation ate a phytoplankon. Throughout the animation, text bubbles were shown to explain learning. The app allows you to do coding through drag and drop commands as well. Your character, who starts in the middle of the page, follows the directions or coding you give them. The commands are very easy to read, and can easily be used by both primary and intermediate levels. The best part is the content easily uploads to FreshGrade, which is great for student portfolios!
I love that although this presentation was on the same topic as Carrie Antoniazzi, both presenters brought a unique perspective to our classroom and provided us with different resources and tools.
I really like the different perspectives on coding you discussed, as I also noticed this. It is so interesting and really shows how easy it is to slightly change each lesson to fit our class but have the same educational purposes behind each- in this case to teach coding.