STEAM Club gets Scratchy

Learners: Kim, Selestine, Sharon, Karis, Harry, Aditi	Learning Coach:  D Wilkes	Date: 12-08-16
Learning Area:  Technology & Maths NZC Achievement Objective:        Level 2-Technological systems:  Understand that there are relationships between the inputs, controlled transformations, and outputs occurring within simple technological systems. Number strategies:  Use simple additive strategies with whole numbers and fractions.	Key Competency:    Thinking Relating to others Participating & Contributing Using language, symbols & text	4C:
Learning Observed: The learners were invited to use the coding program Scratch to create a simple calculator.  We began by logging into the LH1 account and creating a Scratch pad.  Then the learners used some simple code to make the sprite (cat character) say hello.  After that they were presented with a more difficult challenge: This challenge highlighted the learners who were willing to persevere (Selestine & Karis & Kim) and those who required a lot more support.  It was great to see them explore the different types of code and realise that they needed to set up an ‘event’ for each instruction.  I would strongly encourage all of the learners to create their own account and try more of the challenges found here.
Evidence of learning: The learners were making a lot of connections to their previous experiences with coding, maths and the Scratch program.  Harry has been doing his iExplore learning adventure with Scratch and Makey Makey so he was very collaborative and helpful with the younger learners- helping them log in and create their first Scratch pad.  Harry is definitely developing his capabilities with coding in Scratch and at helping others.  Sharon, Selstine, Karis and Kim were having a lot of fun exploring their curiosities at making the cat sprite ‘meow’ and at creating musical instrument sounds.  Aditi enjoyed recording her own voice and making the program repeat her greeting.
Next Learning Steps: Practice using www.scratch.mit.edu to develop their coding capabilities Persevere with the maths challenge to see if they can make a simple calculation Come to STEAM club every week and blog about what they learned Try https://code.org/ for some self directed easy to follow coding tutorials

Sadeen, Selestine & Louisa's Scratch+Makey Makey Learning Story - September 2015

Learner: Sadeen, Selestine & Louisa                      Learning Coach :DWilkes      Date:  Sept 2015- Week 8-10                                                      Learning Area: Technology

Learning Observed

For the past few weeks the learners have been engaged in an innovation station!  The learners were given the choice of 4 provocations which included: creating an Ormibot from scratch, designing an object in Tinkercad to print in the 3D printer, designing a Science experiment or designing a series of code using Scratch and Makey Makey each of which would develop their capabilities.  Sadeen, Selestine and Louisa enjoyed the first week of ‘discovery learning’ where they had some choices of tasks to complete to help them get familiar with the coding programme ‘Scratch’ and the extension kit ‘Makey Makey’ and make connections to their prior knowledge.  They watched tutorials, tried out their predictions and played around with the various affordances of the equipment and programme.  They used the Makey Makey and Scratch to create a piano.  Henry also supported these learners with using the Makey Makey- great collaboration.  For Week 9 and 10 the girls worked collaboratively to design and create a piano game using the Scratch programme and Makey Makey equipment.  In order to piece together the code successfully there was a lot of trialling and prototyping which showed the resilience of Selestine, Louisa and Sadeen.  They showed their curiosity, thinking and managing self skills by looking at what others had done and making connections to what they wanted to achieve.  See some of their learning below!

Evidence of learning

Next Learning Steps

add more code to the game and share it on the LH1 website and/or teach another learner how to code using Scratch complete your design plan more neatly show the code to your family at home keep working on it until it is perfect- use an iBreak?!