DFI - Computational Thinking

 Today was a great day diving a bit deeper with computational thinking.

I had a go with lightbot. This certainly made me think. The first few levels were easy, but it certainly got harder quite quickly. It was great for debugging and thinking how I could improve my code. 

For the afternoon, we looked at creating a maze using Scratch. This is my creation below. I enjoyed being able to add in a second level. It was great for thinking outside the square and problem solving. 

Have a go at my game below. Use your mouse pointer to navigate the car through the maze.

Hapara Champion Educator

 So, since I'm stuck at home not able to drive or do anything else (thanks to ligament damage whilst playing netball), I thought I might as well complete my Hapara Champion Educator certificate.

This was a worthwhile experience, one I would recommend all teachers and facilitators do. I did know quite a bit about the dashboard and sharing facilities, but learnt a few more helpful tips and tricks. 

Now I can proudly display my Hapara badge alongside other my other badges. I wonder what badge I could earn next?

DFI Media

Today we shared the possibilities of media that you can use within your classroom and with your students. There are so many ways to engage students with their learning using Google Apps such as Draw, Slides and of course using the likes of YouTube for creating playlists of rewindable learning for the students.

I presented a breakout on creating pick-a-path stories. I always created my own as they were creating theirs, and I realised that I had left off some important information:

1. Use the titles to name your slides. I did share this with them, but then forgot to show them how if they change the title, it makes it easier to find the right slide you are trying to link to.
2. That all images and text boxes added to the slide will need to have a link back to the current slide so students can accidentally advance to the next slide.
3. I made mention part way through their create that they can use images instead of shapes and text as answers. 

My presentation with instructions.

This is my creation. I'm wanting to do something similar with Ngataki school around blog commenting once we have had a lesson or two around this concept of Smart Relationships.

Screencast Genius!

This is the next course in the Screencastify series of course that are available free to teachers. This course incorporates Google apps to support planning, teaching, assessment and more! There are some valuable ideas shared that I would like to use with my students next year!




Upon completion of the course, I sat the exam.  I didn't pass the first time, but gave it another go.