Coding on the Microbits - Rock Paper Scissors Flowcharts.

 My Year 8 class today were coding with the Microbits. To continue our work on using flowcharts to plan our coding, we wrote the algorithm for playing Rock Paper Scissors and then designed a flowchart to show how the coding flows through. I know this is a bit back to front at the moment but I want them to get used to seeing the flowcharts and how they compare to the blocks on the coding.

Link to work on the class site.

Here are a few of the students blog posts about what we did today

Juel

Fau

Lilly

Link to Google Drawing

Using flowcharts to prep for coding - Part 2

 Last week, my intermediate class were looking at using flowcharts to plan coding. They planned the small sections of how the mBot has to behave to follow the black line. Blog post here

Today, we put together all the parts from the previous couple of weeks. The binary was used to code the mBots and the flowchart and code was all put together to get the final outcome.

The students then had a great time racing the mBots round the course, changing the speed variables and adding lights at every direction change.

Link to Google Drawing here

Using flowcharts to prep for coding

 My intermediate class are coding mBot robots. To get them into it, we have been just kind of launching ourselves in and doing "stuff".

To prepare for the "Follow the line" task (link to task on the class site here) we have been preparing so they know why the code is like it is and why the mBot is behaving as it is. Last week we looked at binary. We did an introduction to what binary is and some whole class activities and then we played some games so they got the hang of it themselves. (link to work here) 

This week we looked at flowcharts and how they help you to plan a sequence of events that have to happen. Link to work on class site here. We went through the symbols and where to find them on Google Drawings then went through the "Do you take sugar" example. The class then had a go with the "Socks" activity themselves and we looked at using loops with the alarm clock example. 

We then started to apply it to the following the black line main activity that they have to do. We went through the sequence that had to happen verbally first so they understood which way the mBot had to go in the four different circumstances. 

• both sensors on the black line, 
• the left sensor on the black the the right sensor on the white, t
• the right sensor on the black the the left sensor on the white, 
• both sensors on the white. 

We did the first two events together, then they had to do they second two themselves. It came together quite well as we were combining the binary work we had done, the flow charts and seeing where it all linked to the coding blocks. Seeing where the flowchart links directly to the coding blocks is good.

Here is my worked example, which I did on a google drawing. Maybe I should have done it on a presentation so each event could have its own page and be clearer to understand. Link to drawing here.

Next week, I want them to combine it all together and upload it to the nMot to see if it works. They will then understand why the numbers on the inputs have to be 0,1,2 or 3 and understand the flow of the algorithm.

Inquiry Question 6 - Academic or Professional Reading Part 1

 The first reading that I am doing this year is "Why Don't Students Like School" by Daniel Willingham.

"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few people engage in it."

"... when we can get away with it, we don't think. Instead we rely on memory"

He talks about how if you had to really think for the whole time instead of using memory for most of it, how that would be really tiring. He relates it to being on holiday where you don't know the language and everything is new. Travelling is really tiring, as all the trivial actions that would be on auto pilot at home have be be thought about the whole time.

"if you repeat the same thought demanding task again and again, it will eventually become automatic; your brain will change so that you can complete the task without thinking about it."

This reminds me of my Karate sensei talking about muscle memory. Repeat, repeat, repeat of the same movements for Kata eventually moved it into memory and then you could start thinking about how to use the movements instead of concentrating on how to do them.

"Despite the fact that we're not that good at it, we actually like to think. We are naturally curious, and we look for opportunities to engage in certain types of thought. But because thinking is so hard, the conditions have to be right for this curiosity to thrive, or we quit thinking rather readily"

"When I say problem solving in this book, I mean any cognitive work that succeeds".

"There is a sense of satisfaction, of fulfilment, in successful thinking".

"When you solve a problem, your brain may reward itself with with a small dose of dopamine, a naturally occurring chemical that is important to the brain's pleasure system".

"working on problems that are of the right level of difficulty is rewarding, but working on problems that are too easy or too difficult is unpleasant".

I have been having conversations with fellow teachers at TC about how the students react to tasks that let them have an obvious, visible improvement over a short period of time. We did a drawing practice activity recently and the students reacted really well to it and wanted to continue. It was set up so they could practice the same skills over and over but the drawn outcome was changing slightly each time. Link to activity on the class site - it was printed out for them to complete with marker pend and coloured pencils.

When I read about the brain giving out pleasure chemicals when you learn something for yourself this made a lot of sense. I could see the students enjoy seeing themselves improve over the time of the activity and will get it back out again to revisit when they are supposed be on something else.

How can I set up more activities like this so they can feel good about the progress they are making and in how they are improving and do it less for "getting credits"?

Inquiry Question 5 - Hypothesise and Research

1. Share your findings about the nature and extent of the student challenge. Make sure it is clear what evidence from your inquiry supports each finding.
2. Explain how some of the data you have used to build a profile of the students’ learning will be used as baseline data at the end of the year.

I have spent some time looking at the statistics that are supplied by our senior management every month.  I wanted to analyse where the credits were being entered over the year to see if there was a pattern at all. If students see themselves getting something concrete out of all the effort every day, like credits, then this will give them that feel good push to keep going. 

To start with I looked at the overall credits from last year to see when they were entered into the management system. Blog post here. What is disappointing when I look at these graphs is how long it takes to get the first credits entered, ie get the first set of work completed. This must be hard for the students to keep working on the same stuff each day without seeing any pay off for such a long time.

Because of this, I next wanted to analyse when the first credits were entered over the last few years. 

• Year 11 tracking blog post here
• Year 12 tracking blog post here

This turned out to be quite late in a lot of cases, not many students when it was earlier and in a couple of cases, terrible. It I am working on mindset, then how is this affecting the students?

As my first thoughts about my inquiry were about supporting the students to feel more confident with their project work, I have asked them what they like when they are getting work sent to them from teachers. Blog post here. 

Things of notes from the results

• Students like quite a varied way of receiving their work
• They like a website / workspace to be well ordered and visually appealing
• They like a mix of verbal and written instructions, with examples to look at and refer to
• They appreciate having instructions and examples rewindable so they can look back at them

I have been experimenting with making a more supportive environment on my class  site to see if they noticed and to see if it made any difference. Blog post here. It is good to see that this small change is already making a difference and they did notice when they were there and when they weren't. 

A big part of getting higher grades at NCEA Design and Visual Communication is the quality of the analysis notes. It is no good me building lots of support into my planning for the drawn elements and not putting the same amount of effort into the literacy elements.

I have done an initial exercise with my Year 11 group. Blog post here. We then did the reading on the class site page  - Exercise 2 - and wrote a sentence based on what we had read. 

"I think that _________ would be a good choice for this chair because _______________"

I will use this as my baseline for the class as we are now going to be doing a lot more work on structuring this to be more supportive. I am going to enlist the help of Marc Milford, our literacy specialist again.

MT	Link	AS	Link
HS	Link	UV	Link
LS	Link	AK	Link
BT	Link	TP	Link
JT	Link	SA	Link
AC	Link	TA	Link

Cluster Create Workshop - Rock Paper Scissors with Microbits

 

For our cluster create staff meeting this term, we all got together at Stonefields School and it was the students this time who were doing the presenting and working with the teachers to show them new things.

My team was some of my lovely Year 8 class from Glenbrae School. We have been doing coding for their Tech rotation so they taught their class of teachers how to code the Microbit to play Rock, Paper, Scissors.

Here is the presentation that they worked through and spoke to.

They presented really well and helped their "class" really well too. Here are a few shots showing them at work.