Digital Fluency Intensive -Session 8 - Computational thinking

Today our connecting with Maniakalani focus was about Empowered learners.

The idea of empowered learning is that the device is not just a tool, it is used to transform the learning experience for students and whanau.

It was eye opening to hear about the daily challenges that many families in low decile areas face, I am sure we have some students in our community who have to worry about some of these problems.

The empowerment of learning gives students the opportunity to take control of their lives and futures. Students becoming digitally literate also gives families opportunities to find control.

Our big idea today was Computational thinking (learning to think like a computer scientist).

This was about empowering students to be digitally fluent and able to use their skills to enable them to be the creators/innovators rather than just the consumers.

We looked at the DLO's from the new digital curriculum. Then we looked at the future of tech which showed  us the future our students are heading into that they types of thinking that they will need to be able to adapt to.

https://studio.code.org/s/mc/stage/1/puzzle/1

In our exploring coding session I chose to look more at the applications/sites we can use as I have had experience to things like CS unplugged. I enjoyed the opportunity we had to explore different websites and ideas we can use with the kids. The block coding was fun and very addictive. I am going to look into Minecraft and similar coding games to link into my literacy programme because I have a group of boys who love Minecraft!

In our create session I chose to have a go with scratch. I had played a little in the past but always felt quite confused by it, so it was great to have a good amount of time to explore the tool and get a grasp on a few of the basic skills so that I feel comfortable to teach my students. Below is a like to the scratch I created. 
Going for a walk scratch

Thanks for reading.

Until next time,

Sarah