I love Hour of Code season! When I first started working with Hour of Code as a school librarian, I often leaned on the Hour of Code resources, which are amazing. Then I noticed more and more classroom teachers using the Hour of Code resources a handful of years ago, and I had access to more makerspace items, so I started incorporating other topics and/or makerspace items into coding like when I recently incorporated Ozobots and some other options with coding related to a book, The Barren Grounds.
Last year I made a choice board to share digitally with teachers and students since we were virtual last December. Late last week, I saw there were several more curriculum specific Hour of Code activities than I recalled seeing before. I also know that with NWEA testing, finals, projects, etc. in different courses or grade levels, that teachers might be able to utilize some subject area specific coding ideas for students who may finish early or need a brain break. So I revamped last year's code choice board to be three slides with different subject area sections. (Note - the options I focused on were geared towards middle schoolers and towards iPads.) If you would like to make your own copy of the above, here is a link that will force you to make a copy of my three embedded slides above and you can edit it however you wish.
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I gave 5th and 6th graders last week three options to connect The Barren Grounds, our choice for this year's Global Read Aloud, and coding with Hour of Code events happening all over this time of year. It's a great way for students to see how literature and coding can connect, to get them thinking creatively, to use that coding mindset of fail and try again, and to just engage them and take a brain break during this time of year.
I showed them what each choice looked briefly, but they had lots of opportunities to ask questions while diving into their choice. I also had a sheet of paper that listed the choices with screenshots, QR codes, and super brief info on how to get started. The choices were:
l needed to craft an annotated bibliography for a graduate course this past semester. I chose Virtual Makerspace as my topic. During this pandemic school year, I have sadly made the call to shut down the physical offerings of the library makerspace. We've been bouncing between hybrid and remote learning. A lot of our makerspace supplies would either be extraordinarily time consuming to sanitize (i.e. Legos) or have technological components that would be damaged by our sanitization supplies. So I was wanting to explore virtual options and resources and did so while working on this project.
I am in the works of creating a Virtual Makerspace on Google Slides with resources in different topics. I hope to share more on that soon. Some of the ebook editions and scholarly articles I used for my annotated bibliography were accessed through the university databases and are not freely available. In this Wakelet I have compiled the resources I used that are freely available. These are memorable titles I read this year with 2020 publishing dates. Must memorable reads from this year with a different publishing date. Here they are gathered in a Goodreads list.
When I first started running activities and promoting Hour of Code from the library a few years ago, I started with the website. Then as more teachers started using the Hour of Code site, I started finding ways to tie in hands on makerspace items and tech for Hour of Code activities and making. But this year, I couldn't do that. Sanitizing maker stuff and keeping it safe during COVID-19 has been pretty much impossible for me, and we just recently went virtual again.
After seeing Shannon McClintock Miller's coding choice boards while researching virtual makerspaces and brainstorming with other awesome librarians in my district, I decided to make my own Hour of Code choice board. The backgrounds/shelves are from Canva. (Remember, teachers get a free pro account.) I used the Chrome Bitmoji extension for the Yay Coding one. Then I took screenshots of what I was linking items to. Once it was finished, I emailed it out to my STEM teachers, and I also let them know about the CodeBytes sessions happening this week. Then I embedded it in my Canvas (our learning management system) and put out an announcement about it in Canvas this morning to let students know it's there. Once we get to winter break, I'll take down the link from the home page, but I'll move it into the virtual makerspace area I'm trying to start building up (moving slowly at the moment due to other urgent tasks), so students can revisit it if they wish. Feel free to download it and edit to upload your own Bitmoji. Please give me credit if you do use it. Thanks! I have these occasional waves of extreme sadness and listening to breakup songs this fall. A few weeks into hybrid when I realized I was doing this, I was completely puzzled. My marriage is fine, so why was I craving break up songs? What’s the deal?
As I pondered this, it occurred to me that public K-12 Ed is a huge “relationship” in my life. “Cause I've built my life around you.” I, like many teachers, have centered much of my life and identity around being an educator. I have repeatedly and staunchly defended public education and educators and poured much of myself into my roles. “Climbed a mountain and I turned around.” “‘Til the landslide brought me down.” Teaching has never been easy, but this year hits different. The pandemic has made obvious some huge issues like:
So what did I do that day in early fall? I started wondering if it was time to take my love and take it down. I started looking at what openings I might be qualified for. Yet my heart was still in education. So days later I looked for more ways to create change in small shifts, for more ways to influence problems I saw. It worked for a while. Today, weeks later, I drove home listening to "Landslide" yet again as I thought about the town being in “red” with 16.6% positivity. I thought about the hundreds of kids I see each day. I thought about my two kids that I’m terrified I’ll bring the virus home to. I wondered to what end so many folks across the nation insist that school buildings stay open. What is this all for? “Oh, mirror in the sky, what is love? Can the child within my heart rise above? Can I sail through the changin' ocean tides?” |
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