Blog
Virtual Workshop Recording: You’re a Computational Thinker
January 27, 2022
Did you miss the virtual workshop, You’re a Computational Thinker on January 26, 2022? Don’t worry, you can watch the recording! This workshop offers an opportunity for teams to build their confidence and competence in computational thinking.
Upcoming Virtual Workshop – Computational Thinking: Break It Down
January 27, 2022
Join us for another hands-on, interactive workshop designed to introduce Computer Science to out-of-school time professionals. More and more afterschool programs, museums, and libraries are adding Computer Science programming. This is an opportunity for your team to build their confidence and competence in this area.
Preparing Younger Kids for Computational Thinking
November 11, 2021
As coding becomes a more widely demanded skill, youth are eager to get on the bandwagon at seemingly younger and younger ages. Incorporating activities that reinforce students’ use of symbols, sequencing, and automation can be great early steps in teaching them to think like a computer.
Crazy About Conditionals
October 25, 2021
Conditionals are one of my favorite coding concepts to teach. It’s a concept that most students grasp easily in unplugged activities. Conditionals are simple “if” statements. If this happens then this will happen. Here are a few ideas and fun games you can use to introduce conditionals to your students.
DeBugging!
October 12, 2021
We all want our kids to become better programmers. The best way to help them learn to code is to actually help them learn how to debug their code. Debugging is a great way for kids to actually find how to solve their problems and work through their code. Experts will say when you find the problem and figure out a solution, it’s actually the best way to learn.
Computer Science Videos Your Students Will Love
September 28, 2021
As a teacher, I know that kids learn in different ways. Some kids learn better by using their hands, some by listening, and others by watching videos. These days, kids are learning how to cook food, make slime, and make themselves better by watching videos. But did you know you can use videos to help teach kids computer science? Here are a few of my favorites.
Galactic Quest, the 2021 National STEM Challenge
September 24, 2021
For the last fourteen years, 4-H has created a fun, hands-on STEM challenge for youth in upper elementary or middle school. For the last five years, the challenges were released in both English and Spanish. The 2021 STEM Challenge, Galactic Quest, explores the history of humans in space, the technology and resources needed for missions, and the obstacles humans encounter in orbit.
Diagramming Program Flow
September 17, 2021
My students had a terrific idea to make a chatbot program, but they couldn’t overcome a bug where their greeting phrase wouldn’t print first. It was their program, and I really didn’t want to debug their code for them, but I knew that if they could step back and see what they had told their program to do, as opposed to what they thought they were telling it to do, they’d be able to sort things out. What could they use to accomplish this?
Playing at Coding
September 3, 2021
Worldwide Day of Play is coming up on September 21, 2021. This annual event was launched by Nickelodeon in 2007 to encourage children and parents to turn off their television and play together! The channel suspended programming for three hours and a special message appeared on the screen. Sometimes we forget how important play is for children, and for adults. Play is important for our well-being, for reducing stress, and for keeping our minds sharp.