The Computational Thinking Duck

The Computational Thinking Duck

One of the key playtime activities that almost every child has engaged in is playing with LEGO bricks. Remember getting the playset, where you had a set of instructions to build a scene? Many a child has followed those instructions to create that scene, and then simply chucked them away to build something totally unique and different. LEGO bricks are a perfect outlet for creativity for both adults and children alike. We can teach not just creative problem solving, but also tackle key concepts in Engineering and Physics amongst others.

This activity uses 6 LEGO bricks. The task is simple. Give each person a set of bricks and tell them to build a duck. What do you come up with? Suitable for all age groups, this activity helps cover key computing and computational thinking concepts such as: algorithms and algorithm design, abstraction, evaluation, logical reasoning and many more. Download the teacher guidance notes below for full details.

Documents
The Computational Thinking Duck.pdf

I must admit when I found this today, that it was out of the blue, I am now trying to find all the bits to make this. It is one thing that I start my classes off with without realising it. I get them using the lego learn to learn series to design and develop a number of different items to get them thinking about design thinking. The duck is the first one of them.

Great Year 9-10 project Makecode - arcade

I have been watching the videos from the BETT 2019 conference today. Microsoft have been releasing some great ideas. One that has me excited is the arcade.makecode.com 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOHiXQTcy4I&feature=youtu.be

They have been developing an interesting idea of game design and linking it in with adafruit hardware as well as other systems that will be coming out in the near future.

arcade.makecode.com/hardware

What could a term look like with adafruit electronics with your game loaded on digital media that you have created on your own 3d printed custom case game device?

I love the idea of a student project that students can take away that has such a uniqueness to it.

included is a blog post showing more ideas https://makecode.com/blog/arcade/01-18-2019

STEM activity - Brain impact simulator

The other part of the video provided an awesome opportunity to hack STEM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOHiXQTcy4I&feature=youtu.be is the new extension to be able to bring in data into excel. Getting into data science, especially designing a new helmet to be able to protect the head from a concussion. It has been interesting over the years having to do concussion tests on students that have had a head clash at lunchtime on the field, also it has been surprising the number of students that have head injuries in school that need time. What a cool way to integrate health and digital technologies using data, as well as getting to understand the issues and why http://www.bluecard.co.nz/ is such an important initiative in sports today.

Integrating technology into this as well as some schools have vacuum formers in which students could investigate the concept and design, and test these. 

Also the idea of developing a textiles solution as well.

Building models to understand and mitigate brain injury

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/education/education-workshop/brain-impact-simulator.aspx

It works with a micro:bit!!!!!

https://aka.ms/brain-impact-instructions/en

It can also be created with an arduino as well.

What awesome ideas for Year 9 or 10.

Could we teach students how to hack hardware. DDDO PO 5

Thinking about the new standards and the opportunities around the integration of learning areas. This is something that is especially part of me and my teaching over the past four years.  Thinking about opportunities to integrate health and digital technologies. I have been the teacher in charge or mountain biking, adventure racing and orienteering, as well as taught two comodules with health and physical education at year 9 and 10.  While there is a lot talked about ethics within digital technologies, the ideas around fitness and the hardware that is now available that students wear or have access to.  is it ethical to hack a device? Is it ethical what about where the data goes? What are the relevant social, ethical and end-user considerations when doing this?  Being able to get this data to be used in an authentic and meaningful context. While the apps show one side of the data, what else is being recorded and sent. Could we be teaching students how to hack their devices? I am looking at the Alternative fit bit, MI Band 2 for this project. Some details if you are hardware inclined: https://medium.com/machine-learning-world/how-i-hacked-xiaomi-miband-2-to-control-it-from-linux-a5bd2f36d3ad python https://github.com/addibble/MiBand2 But as the DDDO PO5 states, with support, so information and guidance can be given to students. Looking at how this might integrate into DDDO progress outcome 5 In authentic contexts and with support, students investigate a specialised digital technologies area (for example, digital media, digital information, electronic environments, user experience design, digital systems) and propose possible solutions to issues they identify. They independently apply an iterative process to design, develop, store and test digital outcomes that enable their solutions, identifying, evaluating, prioritising and responding to relevant social, ethical and end-user considerations. They use information from testing and, with increasing confidence, optimise tools, techniques, procedures and protocols to improve the quality of the outcomes. They apply evaluative processes to ensure the outcomes are fit-for-purpose and meet end-user requirements.