Double Entry Journal #9

Why should programming be part of school curriculum?

Based on the article, programming should be part of the school curriculum because it helps bring students together.  Any type of activity that brings students together naturally and allows them to collaborate on their own is a good program. 

“In addition, groups of youth had begun working collaboratively together to create projects with a group name, such as “DGMM,” for the Dang Good Money Makers” (Kafai, Peppler, and Chiu).

What are the barriers to implementing programming in schools? 

Funding is one of the barriers as it is to all programs.  If there is no money there is no program.  Generally if low income areas are provided resources they are the bottom of the barrel resources. 

“If members of low-income and minority communities gain access to new technologies, they are introduced in such a way that neglects to take the local context into consideration, and are often presented in such ways that reinforce rote learning activities rather than cognitively demanding activities” (Kafai, Peppler, and Chiu).

How can barriers to implementing programming in schools be overcome?

Funding, funding, funding!  Funding is the key because it provides the means for buying materials and hiring help. 

“Fortunately, recent legislation has reappropriated funding to further these efforts, thus establishing CTCs as a fixture in the landscape of technology access” (Kafai, Peppler, and Chiu).).

Week 10 Activity #2

This is the draft of my project.  Level 2 has not been worked on but it will be the same format as level 1 with more difficult equations.

I am also planning on adding to the question bank but I wanted to be sure to fix all the bugs before I added more.  Please let me know if you find any bugs or have suggestions.

Week 10 Activity #1

I created my Story Board in Google Docs.  It is titled Jana's Story Board and can be found HERE.  It doesn't really look anything like the example but I included all of the sections as short sentences or explanations. 

Double Entry Journal #8

“Today, literacy can be broadly defined as including any type of communicative interaction involving speaking, reading, listening, and writing with text in print and non-print forms” Kafai, and Peppler.

I chose the above quote because I have talked about literacy many times before in my blogs.  I became aware of the actual definition and how much it matters in a previous class.  I did not consider myself literate but have completely changed my mind since learning more about literacy.  It is very important and includes so much more than just reading a book as I had first thought. 

When looking for my additional source I began to search digital literacy.  I found the following video from the Literacy Design Collaborative (LDC) on YouTube, LDC: Literacy Matters.  This video is great for teachers and discusses how to create a LDC lessons from start for finish with an example from a real teachers. 

References:

Kafai, Y., & Peppler, K. (n.d.). Collaboration, computation, and creativity: Media arts practices in urban youth culture. Retrieved from http://download.scratch.mit.edu/CSCL07_peppler.pdf

LDC: Literacy Matters video.  Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5EnOVjRPGI

Week 9

Here is a link to a Scratch game that helped inspire my project, it’s called Albert and Sriram'sAmazing Dog Math Game.  I hope to make my game very similar to this but incorporate a different topic.  I am thinking about a game where the player, a scientist from Fairmont State College, has to save the school by balancing chemical equations.  My game will be similar to my example except instead of solving math problems the player will be entering the number that belongs in the chemical equation. 

Just to be sure I didn’t miss any of the questions:

·         What is the academic concept students will be involved in as they play the game?

balancing chemical equations

·         What is the story line?

The player must save the school by balancing equations. 

·         Who is the main character?

A science teacher at FSU

·         What does the main character do to win the game?

The player must enter numbers in the blank to balance the chemical equations and earn points.

·         What challenges will the main character face to move up a level?

The player must get a set number of points in order to change levels.

Double Entry Journal #7

““Literacy” has been defined differently throughout history owing to changes in societal demands. The definition of traditional literacy is the ability to read, write, communicate, and comprehend and has encompassed language skills evolved from writing, vocabulary knowledge, and meaning construction” (Hsu and Wang, 2010).

I enjoyed this week’s article.  It has aspects that apply to me and further enlightened my knowledge of gaming and education.  There are a lot of good ideas in the article which would help incorporate gaming into the classroom.  I have been learning a lot about literacy and this article is no different.  I feel the ideas in the article are very positive and I enjoyed reading it.

For my supporting article I decided to search literacy and gaming.  The video I chose can be found ­here­.  This video is basically and interview from someone from WeroCreative.com and his presentation of the future of gaming and education.  He discusses “blended learning” which is a combination of old and new media and on- and off-line spaces which create a safe learning environment for students.  The article was inspiring and made me do a little more research about WeroCreative.com.
References:

Clare. A. (2010). Games, Gaming, Literacy and Education. AssociationMediaLit. < http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlafLO-VLuQ >

Hsu, H., & Wang, S. (2010). Using gaming literacies to cultivate new literacies. Simulation & Gaming, 41, pp. 400-417. doi:10.1177/1046878109355361

Week 8

This week I created a Pacman project.  It is very simple but I enjoyed SCRATCHing around with it.  So here's my project, I hope you enjoy it!

Double Entry Journal #6

“Not surprisingly and as mentioned earlier, one of the findings that emerged from our research was that students spend a large proportion of their time out-of-school playing digital games” (Spires, Lee, and Lester, 2008).

I chose the above quote from the article because I completely agree with it.  Students spend a lot of time with technology and digital society.  I know most of my high school students carry cell phones many of which are connected to the internet which allows them to “keep in contact.”  By having a phone the students can not only keep in touch through text messages or calls but they can also get on Facebook or Twitter.  There is absolutely no doubt most students spend a large amount of time involved in the digital world. 

For my accompanying resource, I chose a short article from Edutopia.org titled Game-Based Learning to Teachand Assess 21st Century Skills.  The article discusses 21^st century skills and how games can teach and assess these skills. 

Resources:
Miller, A. (2012). Game-Based Learning to Teach and Assess 21st Century Skills. Edutopia.org. <http://www.edutopia.org/blog/game-learning-21st-century-skills-andrew-miller>

Spires, H. A., Lee, J. K., & Lester, J. (2008). The 21st century learner and game based learning. Meridian, 11(1), Retrieved from <http://www.ncsu.edu/meridian/win2008/21st/03.htm>

 

Week 7

This week’s assignment was fun and challenging.  I really had to learn about timing and how to make the text say what I want when I want it to.  I also played around with the backgrounds. 

Here is my Catlib, enjoy!

I also liked seeing everyone’s About Me projects.