[Una Ryan]

Giving students the opportunity to build coding and computer science skills in primary school is vital as society evolves into an ever increasingly technology focused place to interact. Not giving children a safe place to influence and create in coding environments disadvantages them for life-long learning and interaction with the world. Learning to code, and be an active participant rather than a passive consumer of technology gives students the chance to experience new ways of thinking and learning about the world, and also provides them with the scope to identify issues and suggest, test and refine solutions to resolve the challenges they encounter. If students are not given the opportunity to become creators and problem-solvers within technological environments, they remain consumers with limited influence to exert change as the prevalence of technology-focused resources and assets grows in the world they inhabit. By providing playful and engaging opportunities to design, test and evaluate their ideas in technological spaces, we offer students the chance to build skills they will use throughout their education and into the world of work, but also we leverage their capacity to see the world differently before they become more cynical as they get older, and we capture their imaginations to create novel solutions to the problems they encounter in the world around them. Teaching coding in a safe space allows students to engage with technology while also teaching them about keeping themselves safe and offering immediate support to challenges they encounter through shared exploration – building collaboration and communication skills, and allowing them to share experiences with their peers in an environment that is monitored and giving them the freedom to take risks in a safe way.

Having limited exposure and experience of coding to date personally, the concepts introduced through Minecraft for Education emphasised to me how co-learning with students can also be a great way to scaffold student confidence as creators and solution-generators. The fear educators may have of coding and computer science can be counteracted by an openness to learning with students, and acting as a facilitator rather than having to be the subject matter expert day 1. Many students may already have some exposure to coding and computer science, however, others may be disadvantaged by their lack of access to these learning opportunities through no fault of their own. Introducing coding and computer science as part of the overall STEM education offered to students levels the playing field for all students and offers equity to those who might not be exposed to these concepts in their personal lives.

Access to resources may be constrained in schools or homes. Developing a whole-school plan to offer students appropriately levelled access to technology, and ensuring the learning is underpinned by fun, while reflecting the objectives of the curriculum, could offer a solution to challenge of lack of exposure to the ‘business end’ of technology, while also allowing educators an opportunity to upskill. Openness to share skills at a whole-staff level, and openness to learn collaboratively with students in a facilitation role would also allow for better professional relationship building in classrooms and staffrooms.

[Una Ryan]

Curriculum Areas Explored:
Geography: Strand – Human environments (people and communities)
SPHE: Strands – Myself (making decisions); Myself and the wider world (developing citizenship)
Mathematics: Strand – Measures (compare and estimate area)
Learning Outcomes:
Students will develop a resource for their community, looking at a current opportunity in the local area to build an inclusive, environmentally friendly / sustainable asset that will support social engagement for all members of the community, shortlisting and evaluating different needs across all demographics in their local area to establish a social hub that meets the needs of young and older community members with a variety of inclusive resources incorporated into this new social hub.
Student Roles:
Students will need to research, plan and build their social hubs. Roles for students will include a researcher, project manager, timekeeper, builder(s), a presenter and community advocate(s) whose role is to critically evaluate suggestions.
Supporting Work:
Prior to working on the build, pre-discussions on what opportunities in the community can be explored / exploited, research into community need, ‘student in role’ activities in drama to explore the perspective of diverse community members who may not be captured within the student body and brainstorm needs to be supported / resolved by the build, paper / art exercises to aid planning and mapping of the kinds of resources that would be of value to the community.
Build Challenge or Project Prompt:
Collaboratively build a community resource and hub that resolves at least one of the pre-existing gaps within the community identified in the discussions and brainstorming sessions conducted as part of the supporting work, with an emphasis on the use of sustainable materials and resources, and inclusion of all team members, to ultimately include the entire community in the output of the build.

[Una Ryan]

In evaluation of where a school is with its use of technology, it’s critical that teachers are honest about their actual skill level, and that information sharing is open and collaborative. Teachers come from diverse backgrounds, just like the students in the school, and the tools used in one classroom might be unique to the needs of that particular class, but there will always be an opportunity to leverage knowledge to consider alternative resources for the school to include in plans for future funding, and resources that a staff member may have been made aware of that other staff haven’t yet encountered. Especially as the use of digital technology increases within schools, making sure students are actually proficient users who are involved in the mechanics of how technology works, rather than latent consumers of technology, is really important from the early stages. All children are exposed to huge amounts of technology in their lives, even if technology access is restricted at home, but so much of the use of this technology is as passive consumers, rather than active participants in the use of these tools. For the learning in a classroom to be meaningful, and provide children with skills for an evolving world where technology’s integration into how and what we do is ever increasing, making sure that students can use the technology to create and problem-solve, but also ensuring that they know enough about what they’re using to keep themselves safe, is vital. Critical and frank evaluation of where a school is on its digital technology journey will only serve to better benefit both the staff in terms of their own skill development, but also the students in attaining adequate skills for life-long learning.

[Author]

Posts