I explored Basketball Coding today. The game allows you to move the hand to catch the ball and shoot it towards the basket. You can also create your own form of the game with the code like making new balls appear every time the ball hits the player's hand. It was a fun game, and I can use it as a teacher to allow students to use code and use creativity to make their own version of the code.
Video of the Basketball Coding game.
4d: Create CS and CT learning environments that value and encourage varied viewpoints, student agency, creativity, engagement, joy, and fun.
With this game, you can create your own version with the code to do different things. This encourages creativity and joy from students to make their own version.
Picture of the game and code.
You can find the basketball coding game on Code.org or you can use your phone and scan this code.
Standard 5: Computational Thinker. Students develop and employ strategies for understanding and solving problems in ways that leverage the power of technological methods to develop and test solutions.
Today we visited the iCreate Lab in the library (room 217). We were shown a room for laser cutting. There was also an embroidery machine, sewing machine, and Cricut Maker on a table. I ended up watching how to use the embroidery machine to make a design on fabric. The lady was having issues using the embroidery machine because it kept stopping and saying error. She kept trying to change tension and find out how to fix the issue.
Embroidery machine making the pig design.
Someone came and helped her fix it, and the pig design finished. Then she did the letters KF, and the whole design was finished. It was a cool thing to see because I have never seen an embroidery machine before.
Finished product with embroidery machine.
The Makerspace Movement
I can use these concepts to get students thinking and make new designs to solve problems. If we use a piece of technology that acts up like the embroidery machine, students can test ways to see how they can solve the problem. It may take a little longer to get things done, but the problem will get the students thinking. I could also let students make their own design that's different from what's available. It lets them be creative and demonstrate competency as they try something new. They would also be using the technology in a new way because it might not have ever done this new design.
Another design someone made with the embroidery machine.
1d: Develop resilience and perseverance when approaching CS and CT learning experiences, build comfort with ambiguity and open-ended problems, and see failure as an opportunity to learn and innovate.
3b: Apply effective teaching strategies to support student collaboration around computing, including pair programming, working in varying team roles, equitable workload distribution and project management.
Today in class, we explored DroneBlocks and programmed a drone to do different things. We did have a few problems starting out because the drone would not connect to the app. After a bit of coding, we managed to get Tello (the drone) to do some flips while moving around. After a bit of programming, Tello would not follow the code and would just hover a bit before landing. We did try again and again to get it to do more, but Tello wouldn't do more.
A classmate did some research and found that Tello might not be responding because of the battery overheating. Considering that the battery had become really hot, we determined that the the battery overheating was the reason for Tello to stop responding. We plan to keep that in mind when using Tello again to do more things with coding.
In this video, Tello was programmed to do some flips.
Code used to make Tello flip.
Using Tello was quite the learning experience although we ran into some issues. It was an opportunity to improve for when we use Tello again. I also did my part in being a team member with using Tello. Aleksandra programmed Tello (she had the code), Jasmine was giving Alexsandra codes to try out, and Kelly helped out in any way she could including charging the drone as we figured out how to connect it to DroneBlocks.
When Tello was just hovering and not following the code.
Today in class, we learned about DroneBlocks Simulator. DroneBlocks allows you to connect to a drone called Tello and program it to do things. We read over how to work it because class was online due to the tropical storm. The website we found the information was learn.droneblocks.io with Marissa Vickery. I went through the Introduction to Tello EDU Drone Programming with DroneBlocks module.
Some important things to do before using the drone is to make sure the propellers are secured. The battery should be charged, inserted into the drone correctly, and you need to have a backup battery. Tello should be used in a big room if a lot of drones are used. The area around Tello should be clear, so it doesn't collide into obstacles which can damage Tello. The module also gives specifics about using DroneBlocks on certain devices to connect to Tello.
This is one code that Tello can be programmed to do.
Takeoff has Tello go up about 4-5 feet (1.5 meters) into the air. You can also use fly up or fly down to get Tello to fly higher or lower. Distance for Tello is relative to position. Tello might have some marginal errors since it doesn't have GPS. For example, you might command it to fly forward 60 inches, but it might go only 55 inches. Hover means that Tello will stay in one place for a certain time like five seconds.
This is a box technique to where the magenta arrow is the direction the drone is facing.
Another term that I learned from the module was yaw or yawing which is an aeronautical term for rotating about a vertical axis. There was also the term loop ("repeat" block in DroneBlocks) which is used for repetitive commands to make it one command. A code with loops is also referred to as refactored meaning restructured or revised.
This is the box technique of yaw with the magenta arrow showing the yaw or direction of flight.
Here is an example of the box technique as a code.
Here is the box technique with loop and a fly up command.
This is very helpful to learn for when I use DroneBlocks to program Tello. I can't wait to try out some code and see Tello fly in class Wednesday.
Objective: The objective of this activity is to build a space rover that can explore a surface. This is done by coding it to do a specific task like sweeping, grabbing, or moving up and down. The head also has a motion sensor that will stop the rover if something blocks its' way. This can be done by testing out how it moves until the rover achieves its' task. This will give students a better understanding of code. Students can also learn the engineering and science aspect of rovers through this activity.
1a: Set professional learning goals to explore and apply teaching strategies for integrating CT practices into learning activitiesin ways that enhance student learning of both the academic discipline and CS concepts.
1c: Leverage CT and CS experts, resources and professional learning networks to continuously improve practice integrating CT across content areas.
1d: Develop resilience and perseverance when approaching CS and CT learning experiences, build comfort with ambiguity and open-ended problems, and see failure as an opportunity to learn and innovate.
5a: Evaluate and use CS and CT curricula, resources and tools that account for learner variability to meet the needs of all students.
5c: Use a variety of instructional approaches to help students frame problems in ways that can be represented as computational steps or algorithms to be performed by a computer.
Activity Outline
Introduction:
I would discuss with the students about rovers and what they can do. Then I will let them ask questions about rovers. Once questions are over, I will discuss what the activity is to them, and I would let the students ask any further questions about the activity.
Create Phase:
I will allow the students to either build their own rover or use a template to build it. Instructions for the rover I made can be found under model library with part one being titled as 2. drive and part two is titled as 2b. Rover on the WeDo 2.0 app. The time it takes to build the rover depends on what type the student makes.
Coding Phase:
The students will then code the rover to do a task. The task I did was move across the surface. The students can also do that same task and practice making it move. I would remind them that it is okay if it takes them a bit to figure the code out because they are only starting to learn coding. I've even made mistakes because I am still learning.
Conclusion
I will have the students share what they did, so they can see the different things they can achieve. I would also recommend Code.org for students to continue to practice coding. It is very important for students to learn coding because coding is used for lots of things. This activity can help them start their journey with coding.
In today's IDET 4300 STEM Technology class, we used the ITSE standards as shown below and can be found on my ITSE standards portfolio.
1c: Leverage CT and CS experts, resources and professional learning networks to continuously improve practice integrating CT across content areas.
5b: Empower students to select personally meaningful computational projects.
4d: Create CS and CT learning environments that value and encourage varied viewpoints, student agency, creativity, engagement, joy and fun.
In today's lab, we were using WeDo 2.0 Legos to create something that moved. I was working on making a vehicle that moved, but I saw a fellow classmate named Jasmine Cahill who made a cooling fan. She got it to spin through the WeDo 2.0 app. The video shown below is hers, but I do hope to make my own working WeDo project next time and post my own video. It was really cool to see the fan spin though.
This was a video made by Jasmine Cahill.
This is the code Jasmine Cahill did.
I know students of all ages would be curious about how to work the different projects like this fan. I know I was really curious and trying to build something on my own that did share similarities with Milo the Science Rover. My only issue was having to download with my laptop because the battery was low and the WeDo 2.0 apps compatibility to devices.
In IDET 4300, STEM Technology, we are fulfilling the ISTE CT Standards. The first standard can be found under the Learner tab on my ISTE standards portfolio or as listed below:
1a: Setprofessional learning goalsto explore and apply teaching strategiesforintegrating CT practices into learning activities in ways that enhance student learning of both the academic discipline and CS concepts.
In class, we were split up into groups and each given a coding term. My group's coding term wasvariables. I went to the website Code.org specifically for games about each coding term to gain a better understanding of my coding term. The term variables is defined as a storage location for certain values of data. My game I played was called Using Variables with the artist.
Activity:
The goal is to get the artist to go draw the triangle. In this example with part 4 of the lesson, you needed to use the code from part 3 and add 10 length to it. The length in this situation is the variable for the code. As you continue on in the lesson, you will be given more challenging shapes to make with variables. The video shown below shows part 4 of the lesson as an example of variables.
