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Scratch is a programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art -- and share your creations on the web.
As young people create and share Scratch projects, they learn important mathematical and computational ideas, while also learning to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively.
What is Computational Thinking? Computational thinking (CT) involves a set of problem-solving skills and techniques that software engineers use to write programs that underlie the computer applications you use such as search, email, and maps. Here are specific techniques.
- Decomposition: When we taste an unfamiliar dish and identify several ingredients based on the flavor, we are decomposing that dish into its individual ingredients.
- Pattern Recognition: People look for patterns in stock prices to decide when to buy and sell.
- Pattern Generalization and Abstraction: A daily planner uses abstraction to represent a week in terms of days and hours, helping us to organize our time.
- Algorithm Design: When a chef writes a recipe for a dish, she is creating an algorithm that others can follow to replicate the dish.
ITEM TWO:
2013 National STEM Video Game Challenge!
ITEM THREE:
Click on image above.
This young man is Nathan whom I have communicated with via email. He uses a program similar to Sketchup in order to do 3-D drawings of original objects. Then he emails these drawings to a company in the Netherlands called
SHAPEWAYS.
This is a piece that Nathan had printed by Shapeways. This is also his storefront site which is free to anyone where they can exhibit and sell their pieces. Final pieces can be rendered in nine materials such as plastic, ceramics, pewter, stainless steel, silver and gold. People order from his storefront site and Shapeways sends him his money.
ITEM FOUR:
What about the possibility of having technology workshops for students throughout the county with AIG students serving as technical assistants. These could be elementary and middle school students. Why technology workshops for students? I think the ultimate goal in having them use technology should be knowing how to use a tech tool from start to finish. When the teachers and media specialists work with the students, they basically prepare everything for them such as: going to the site, signing in and preparing the tool or program for their use. If we want to prepare them for college and to become 21st century learners, they have to know the entire process of these tech tools. There's a big difference from sitting in front of a camera and saying a few lines that you have written for a screencast than opening up the site, signing in, preparing to record, getting the background image in place, preparing the webcam, starting and stoping the screencast and publishing it to the internet or to the computer. I think the students would love to learn various technological tools and appreciate our confidence in them while using these tools. These workshops could be seated to begin with and possibly go to online tutorials. AIG students might even help create the tutorials.
ITEM FIVE:
NOT JUST CHECKING OUT BOOKS
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