Playing a 2 Player Strategy Game on an iPad

I have been working on incorporating more computational thinking skills into my curriculum.  

Some skills that my students need to develop are:

Learn to work together to figure out how to solve problems.

Develop partnership skills:  taking turns, working together, resolve conflicts.

I chose to incorporate a 2 player strategy games using mobil devices to enhance team work skills that students are having a difficult time developing.  These skills are much needed in today's workplace.

My class played "New World Colony" as a 2 person game rather than playing against the computer. The game play is very similar to a traditional board game. The task was for the students to work with their partner to figure out the best strategies to play the game.  The things we learned from playing the game are:
1.  Many students need to develop their partnership skills.
2. This game gives a lot of directions at the beginning which makes it harder to figure out the strategies.
4.  Students preferred to play an iPad game rather than a board game.
4.  We advise game writers to give directions as players "level up" in a game, rather than all the directions in the beginning of a game.  The students quickly recognized that is easier to learn a game that introduces new concepts as you “level up”.
5.  This was a fun learning experience that the students would like to continue to at home.
6.  Kids can engage in computational thinking strategies from evaluating games and designing their own games.

I believe this was a successful lesson.  Many students said they wold play the game again at home. Some students even requested to play the game again in another class.  

Students Participate in a Live Webinar

Today I had the privilege of observing students view a live webinar.  Explore.org has a channel with information from people who are currently studying polar bears.  The experts did a live webinar and invited middle school and high school students to view their working environment and ask questions about polar bears and the climate.

At first the students were very excited to be a part of a live webinar, and were very excited to see the videos about polar bears.  As the webinar progressed, I began to wonder how is the better than watching a documentary about polar bears?  I sensed the students were also becoming bored with the presentation.

as soon as the experts started answering questions, the student once again became engaged and excited. There seemed to be a some competition to see if the experts would answer answer any of the questions from our classroom.  I was very pleased to see the students motivated to participate.

After the webinar was finished I was amazed to see how improved communications can change classroom activities.  Students were definitely more engaged than they would have been by reading a book.  They were more excited to be part of a "live" webinar.  The unintended outcome was the students' desire for fame may have been a road block to critical thinking.  The students seemed to be more in interested in getting their name and school announced than concerned about the quality of the questions they were asking, and exceptional opportunity they had to communicate with experts in the field.

Students Will Step Up to a Challenge

I have some students whose computer skills are more advance than many of their peers. I offered to let some of the 7th grade students work on the 8th grade unit using App Inventor. Those students will complete create the same apps that the 8th grade students are currently doing. Because I never have enough time to help all the students during class time when we do App Inventor, they will be my assistant teachers when they are in 8th grade. Another 7th grade students chose to purchase a Javascript tutorial, and do a chapter each week rather than the assignment the other eight grade students are doing. This has made my classroom a better work environment because the students who were bored and distracting other students have now been challenged, and use their work time much more productively.

Learning about a Global Classroom

Recently I have decided that I needed help meeting the Communication and Collaboration Standard in my classroom.  I naively enrolled in the Flat Classroom Certified Teacher Course.  Although I was aware of the need to bring some global learning opportunities into the classroom, I did not know how much I have to learn about electronic collaboration and communication.  The first six weeks of the course has provided a tremendous number of opportunities (aka tons of homework) to reflect on my teaching practices.  I have already begun to improve some of my classroom projects.  

I added computer science/computer programming concepts to the eighth grade curriculum and designed a project using an iPad game, CargoBot with a collaborative writing assignment in which the students had to document how they solved various levels of the game.

The positive effect of success of the new collaborative assignment inspired me to have my 5th grade students collaborate on a project about validating information found on the internet.  Is there really a tree octopus?  This assignment usually took the students 2 - 3 class periods to complete.  When I allowed them to work collaboratively and present their findings, we accomplished the entire lesson in 1 class period.  WOW!  In addition we had better classroom discussions.  Now I need to create a lesson in which the students work collaboratively with someone outside their classroom.

Our next Flat Classroom assignment is to use a wiki as the only communication tool to collaborative produce a multi-media project.   Hmmm....which of my past units is going to become a collaborative research project which includes student made videos?

Just Learning Humor:

Today I was supervising "Choice" time in the computer lab.  Some students who had just learned to use Google Docs for class wanted to "e-mail" each other.  They were able to successfully share a document with their peers, watch each other add ideas to the page.  They were so proud that they figured out how "e-mail" just like their parents do.  It did seem to be an efficient way for a small group of kids to communicate.  It is so amazing what kids will figure out for themselves.

The First Week of School

120 iPads to smiling students at Edgewood Campus School in Madison, Wisconsin.