[Year 12 SofDev] sofdev Digest, Vol 122, Issue 22
Russo, Frank R
Russo.Frank.R at edumail.vic.gov.au
Thu May 28 16:50:18 AEST 2015
Hi Fellow Educators
I am teaching Robotics this year for the first time as a year 10 elective to try and motivate some of our less academic students.
I have 22 students of which 4 are girls, they all seem to really enjoy it, it is a big investment $$$ wise we purchased Lego Mindstorms Education Core Set (10) and Expansion Sets (5).
Thanks to the support of my school principal for the initial $6000 and then a dedicated room so that we do not have to pack it all away and that end of each session.
Have set up teams of 2 or 3 students working collaboratively using a dedicated Laptop for each team which has the build instructions and programming component for each Robot.
The students love the building process and have made some very impressive projects showing real growth and challenge from something simple at the beginning of the year to quite complex examples of what a real life solution or application would be.
I have an Autistic student who thrives in this class and is able to build projects so quickly that it is an amazing skill, he doesn't like the programming side but appreciates the work that goes into it.
I have really enjoyed teaching this subject and find myself most weekends playing with Lego and programming it so that I can help the kids should they have issues.
A lot of it is very intuitive which makes it a lot easier.
Frank
[cid:image001.png at 01D09966.60A90D30]
Frank Russo
Mobile: 0409022197
Work: 9781 7700
Daily Organiser
Teacher:- IT, Game Design, Robotics, Maths & Science
AEU Branch President
Consultative & Planning Committee Member
Monterey Secondary College
Silvertop Street
Frankston North
Victoria, Australia
-----Original Message-----
From: sofdev-bounces at edulists.com.au [mailto:sofdev-bounces at edulists.com.au] On Behalf Of Weiyuan, Xin X
Sent: Thursday, 28 May 2015 12:47 PM
To: sofdev at edulists.com.au
Subject: Re: [Year 12 SofDev] sofdev Digest, Vol 122, Issue 22
Hi Laurie,
What type of robotic system do you use?
Regards,
Weiyuan
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: A research question... (Laurie Savage)
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Message: 1
Date: Thu, 28 May 2015 12:39:30 +1000
From: Laurie Savage <08327998 at pvgc.vic.edu.au<mailto:08327998 at pvgc.vic.edu.au>>
Subject: Re: [Year 12 SofDev] A research question...
To: "Year 12 Software Development Teachers' Mailing List"
<sofdev at edulists.com.au<mailto:sofdev at edulists.com.au>>
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Looks like an interesting course, what proportion of your enrolments would be female? I have a group of 23 year 9 students doing HTML/CSS coding and Robotics next semester.
Laurie Savage
https://sites.google.com/a/pvgc.vic.edu.au/mr-savage/home
On 28 May 2015 at 09:36, Howard, David <dhoward at stmichaels.vic.edu.au<mailto:dhoward at stmichaels.vic.edu.au>>
wrote:
> Morning,
>
> It is all down to making the courses relevant and exciting for students.
> They don?t want to be doing excel and access. They want to be creating
> solutions that they see as relevant to them. If you can pitch a
> subject where they can see it being beneficial for their future you
> will get numbers.
>
> Our numbers are strong and continue to be strong. I have around
> 30-40% of the Year 9 co-hort who go through the elective subjects. I
> think that is massive.
>
> We do Game Dev in Year 9
>
> Future Tech & Mobile App Dev (semester 1) and Web Dev (semester two)
> - HTMl, JS, CSS, mySQL etc in Year 10.
>
> *David Howard*
> Head of Learning Systems <http://twitter.com/StMichaelsGS>
> <https://services.stmichaels.vic.edu.au/fb.cfm>
> <https://www.linkedin.com/company/st-michael%27s-grammar-school> *25
> Chapel Street, St Kilda VIC 3182 Australia*
> <https://www.stmichaels.vic.edu.au/> *t* +61 3 8530 3272
> *e* dhoward at stmichaels.vic.edu.au<mailto:dhoward at stmichaels.vic.edu.au> *f* +61 3
> 9510 3161 *w* stmichaels.vic.edu.au <https://www.stmichaels.vic.edu.au/> CRICOS
> Provider 00345G Please consider the environment before printing this
> email
>
> From: <Wraight>, Timothy J <wraight.timothy.j at edumail.vic.gov.au<mailto:wraight.timothy.j at edumail.vic.gov.au>>
> Reply-To: Year List <sofdev at edulists.com.au<mailto:sofdev at edulists.com.au>>
> Date: Thursday, 28 May 2015 9:24 am
> To: Year List <sofdev at edulists.com.au<mailto:sofdev at edulists.com.au>>
> Subject: Re: [Year 12 SofDev] A research question...
>
> I have some strong thoughts on this as well. I think there has been
> a serious misunderstanding of the difference between ?using? ITC and
> ?learning? ITC. ITC is now been used very effectively in many areas
> of education as a learning tool and I think many people think that
> this means students are ?learning? ITC. But it needs to be remembered
> that it is just a tool in these situations, used to help impart
> knowledge and skills of what ever the subject matter is, but you are not learning about it.
>
> ITC is now been used in the same way in the classroom that you would
> use pens, paper, whiteboards etc. While using these things in an
> everyday setting a student isn't learning about how the book is made,
> where the paper came from, and the processes involve in producing it.
> Yet in our curriculum we have areas in which students learn about
> these things, they learn about natural resources in science and
> humanities, they learn how to work with materials such as paper and
> produce things in art and technology subjects. I believe it is
> exactly the same with ITC, there is nothing wrong with it being
> increasingly used as a tool throughout the curriculum but it still
> needs to be studied seperately, so that students can gain understanding of how it works, what makes it up and where it comes from.
> Not only that, studying ITC seperately means that they will be able to
> use it more effectively when they use it in other subjects. One of
> the biggest problems I see these days is students (and teachers!) know
> how to use ITC really well as long as it works as intended. As soon
> as something goes wrong they are lost, because they have no deeper
> understanding of it to be able to troubleshoot!
>
> We need to remember that using ITC is not the same as learning ITC!
>
> *Tim Wraight*
> *VCE Information Technology and Mathematics Teacher* Williamstown High
> School Pasco Campus
> 9397 1899
> wraight.timothy.j at edumail.vic.gov.au<mailto:wraight.timothy.j at edumail.vic.gov.au>
>
>
>
> On 28 May 2015, at 8:33 am, Kent Beveridge
> <kbeveridge at stbc.vic.edu.au<mailto:kbeveridge at stbc.vic.edu.au>>
> wrote:
>
> My thoughts are simple, with the rise and rise of the iPad and
> similar technologies, the perceived 'need' for mainstream IT subjects
> has been undermined and watered down to non importance. Many staff,
> new young graduates included, give my observations that they feel they 'know it all'
> and hence don't see the importance of a standalone subject.
> Attitudes like this have even turned off a recent former student who
> had aspirations of IT teaching to now not wanting to go there...
> Makes me wonder.
>
> Kent Beveridge
> Teacher
>
> On 27 May 2015, at 11:15 pm, Tracey Hubert <traceyhubert at gmail.com<mailto:traceyhubert at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> Hello,
>
> I am a pre-service IT teacher and long-time lurker. I am working on
> an assessment investigating issues and debates around the
> implementation of the (proposed) Digital Technologies curriculum and
> the implications for schools and teachers. In the Donnely and
> Whiltsire review, they propose that IT remain a general capability and
> the standalone subject be scrapped or made optional. One of the
> arguments is there are not enough suitably qualified teachers and that
> it can be taught across the disciplines. They obviously miss the point that ITC != computational thinking.
>
> I am curious to hear what practicing IT teachers think about this
> assertion. I went to a school tour on Friday and was surprised to
> learn they didn't offer IT as a subject at all, not even in VCE. No
> electives in Year 9. Nothing. I had a look at the overall statistics
> for VCE IT apps and VCE Software Development and saw enrolments are
> significantly down from their 2000?2001 peak. During the online PD for
> the new VCE subjects, Paula Christophersen mentioned they have
> increased this year by 10%, but it still seems quite low given the
> ubiquity of tech and the push for STEM subjects in general.
>
> I was wondering if anyone has any insight as to why they think the
> numbers have dropped in they way they have. It can't only be explained
> by the scaling down, can it?
>
> TIA
> Tracey
>
>
> Click here <https://www.mailcontrol.com/sr/MZbqvYs5QwJvpeaetUwhCQ==>
> to report this email as spam.
>
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